TROUBLE IN CAMP.

Auckland Star, Volume LXIV, Issue 233, 3 October 1933, Page 9

TROUBLE IN CAMP.

SEVENTEEN MEN DEPART.

DISPUTE OVER DISMISSAL.

(By Telegraph.—Own Corresporulent.) MASTERTON, this day.

| Alleging general dissatisfaction with the conditions ruling, about half the men have left the Masterton County Council's relief camp for single men at Blairlogie. The men state that trouble had been brewing at the camp for some time and that matters came to a head with the dismissal of one man for too much talk and not enough work.

Mr. J. C. D. Macklev, clerk to the Masterton County Council, characterised the men's allegations as quite unfounded and misleading.

I Officials of' the Masterton Relief Workers' Union alleged that there had been [a general tightening up of discipline, I restriction of food supplies, and a demand for increased work. This undercurrent of dissatisfaction, they stated, had come to a head. It is alleged that when Mr. Mackley visited the camp he refused an invitation by the chairman of the camp committee to meet the men and hear their side of the dispute. As the result of the dismissal of one man 17 others left the camp and came into iMasterton. Exception was taken by the moil to the demand of those controlling it that before a man left camp , he should secure a ticket of leave and state where he intended going and at what time he expreted to return. When interviewed, Mr. Macklev stated that_ a majority of the allegations were quite unfounded and that the alleged facts as given were misleading. The men, he stated, were working under exactly the same conditions as they had always been working under and there had been no tightening up. As regards food, if anything, the supply was a - little more liberal. Mr. Macklev said he refused to interview the men as a whole,-but he did discuss the matter with the men s representative. Twenty-three men were still in camp. Some of those who had I left Mr. Macklev said, had since made I personal application for reinstatement.