STATEMENT BY UNION COMPANY'S MANAGER.

Press, Volume XLIX, Issue 14564, 15 January 1913, Page 10

STATEMENT BY UNION COMPANY'S MANAGER.

(SPECIAL TO "THE PRESS.") WELLINGTON, January 14. In respect to the complaints by the Seamen's Union of tlie hard work in the Mapourika's stokehold, the manager of th© Union Company (Mr Kennedy) states that the Mapourika has been engaged in her present running for nearly fifteen years with tho same number of men below as at present. Th© running of the vessel is an ideal one for men having their homes in Wellington, as they have had plenty of leisure and every Sunday off during the whole of tho time the Mapourika has been in commission, and until th© demand was made for three extra firemen just before Christmas, no representations had been mad';> to tho Company that the stokehold hands had been working under adverse conditions. The arbitrary holding up of the vessel was th© first intimation received, and it has only been by the exertions of the Union Company's officials to 6ecur© other hands to man th© vessel, that the Company has\ been able to keep faith with the publio by maintaining the time-table running up to the present. Tho Wcstport Coal Co.'s collier Ro gulus has also been laid up indefinitely.