NO WAGES INCREASE.

Auckland Star, Volume LXVIII, Issue 280, 25 November 1937, Page 28

NO WAGES INCREASE.

BOROUGH COUNCIL STAFF.

RESOLUTION UPHELD. (From Our Correspondent.) HAMILTON, Wednesday. A motion that the Borough Council should rescind the former resolution adopting the wagee award of the Arbitration Court for local body labourers was tabled by Mr. R. A. Lafferty at a meeting of the council to-night. The resolution in question, which was carried last October, was one reducing the labourers' wages from £4 12/ to £4 8/4. "Prior to the award's coming into force the men were .supposed to lose time when it was wet," Mr. Lafferty said. "I saw men in the heavy rain to-day, which made me realise that the penny an hour we were going to eave is not much,** declared Mr. Lafferty. In seconding the motion, Mr. W. A. Curteis said the men were getting an extra hour a week because they had to work, rain or no rain, while other employees had not. Opposing the motion, Mr. J. E. Tidd said the Court had given ite ruling after considering exhaustive evidence. "If we carry the motion we are running directly against the decision of the Court," Mr. Tidd declared.

The deputy-mayor, Mr. H. D. Caro, said the council would be creating a dangerous precedent m voting against the findings of the Arbitration Court. The Mayor, Mr. J. R. Fow, doubted whether the workers themselves wished to go against the findings of the Court. Mr. Lafferty said that in his notice of motion he was not suggesting that the council should deviate from the decision of the Court. It had merely fixed a minimum wage, and the council had a perfect right to pay wages above that figure.

The motion was then put to the vote, and was lost by nine votes to two.