BACK AT WORK.

Auckland Star, Volume LXVII, Issue 196, 19 August 1936, Page 8

BACK AT WORK.

WAIKATO MINERS.

I ONE-DAY STOPPAGE. !' | "IN NO SENSE A STRIKE." ! STATEMENT BY SECRETARY. | (By Telegraph.—Own Correspondent.) i HUNTLY, this day. All mines in the Waikato are working to-day, following the decision rna-le last evening by the miners to resume work pending further negotiations with the erhployers and the national organisation concerned with the hearing of disputes. In a statement issued by the secretary of the Northern Coal Miners' Union, Mr. T. Ilall, jun., it is denied that the stoppage of work at the Glen Afton, Taupiri and Renown mines was "in any sense a strike." "Conference Refused." "In the last six months we have had six disputes not covered by the existing agreement," said Mr. Hall. "Under a clause in the agreement we are entitled to demand that what is called a disputes committee shall be set up, representing both employers and employees, for the purpose of discussing points in dispute. Failing a decision there is the right to appoint an independent chairman, whose decision is final. "We have approached the. Coal Mine Owners' Association three times in the last five weeks asking that they should meet us and discuss matters not covered by the agreement. On Saturday we received a definite reply from Mr. T. O. Bishop, secretary of the New Zealand Coal Mine Owners' Association, that they were not prepared to meet us. "We went to work on Monday because we had decided that, failing a favourable reply from the coal mine owners, we should stop the mines yesterday morning in order to discuss the matter. We notified the mine owners to that effect a week ago. Men's Grievances. "It was in no sense a strike," said Mr. Hall, "but owing to the mines and the mine workers being scattered, a day off work is required to get round all members organised in the district. A meeting was held in the railway station yesterday morning, and it was intended to go to work in spite of the previous decision. But the meeting was so prolonged that the trains and buses left for the mines without the men. "The meeting adjourned from the station to the Lyceum Theatre and continued until 11 a.m. The executive of the union then began a round of the mines at Glen Afton, Renown and Rotowaro, and meetings of miners resident there were held. By last evening the whole of the members of the union had reached the one decision to return to work to-day pending further negotiations. "The points that it was proposed to bring before the disputes committee Telated to the payment of miners engaged in assisting truckers in the Renown mine, this work not being covered by.the agreement, and the payment of miners at the McDonald mine at Olen Afton engaged in 'drawing timber,' which is the miners' term for removing props in the pillar retreat."