GENERAL WAGE INCREASE

Bay of Plenty Times, Volume LXXVI, Issue 14711, 1 July 1948, Page 3

GENERAL WAGE INCREASE

FEDERATION’S APPLICATION FOR FIXTURE

AMENDMENTS SOUGHT TO BASIC RATE

(P A,)' Wellington, June 30. An application for a fixture to hear pleas for a general order to raise the basic wage for aduL and female workers was made to the Court of Arbitration today. The applicant was the Federation of Labour in the name of the Wellington, Nelson, Westland and Marlborough Local Bodies, Other Labourers, and Related Tracies’ Union. The federation’s letter asked the basic wage be amended from the Court’s last order on November 2, 1936, under its powers granted in the Industrial Conciliation and Arbitration Amendment Act, 1936. Mr Justice Tyndall, president of the Court, said that this power of

the Court had been made obsolete by the Minimum Wage Act, 1945. This made the question of fixing the basic wage a legislative one, although, of course, the procedure which the federation intended to adopt was still possible. He deferred the making of a definite fixture so that the Court could consider the matter.

The Arbitration Court’s last basic wage order in 1936 was £3 16s for males and £1 16s for female workers. The present minimum wages for those workers paid by the week are £5 15$ for males and £3 15s for female adult workers.