RENT OF RAILWAY HOUSES

Press, Volume LXX, Issue 21335, 30 November 1934, Page 21

RENT OF RAILWAY HOUSES

SETTLEMENT OF DISPUTE O?RU3S 4S3OCUTIOH TSLBGRAy.) WELLINGTON, November 20. A settlement of the dispute between the Amalgamated Society of Railway Servants and the Railway Department about the rent to be charged for railway dwellings has been reached. The Railway Department had taken the ground that the dwellings did not come within the scope of the National Expenditure Adjustment Act. but the society took the case to the Court of Appeal which suggested that there should be a settlement by negotiation, as the matter could not be simply arranged by applying a general reduction in, terms of the statute. The secretary to the society said today that the executive council of the Focietv had had long negotiations with the department and had finally consented to an offer under which a reduction of 10 per cent, would be granted in respect of all railway dwellings as from April 1, 1932, to March 31 1934. The excess rent paid during that period was to be refunded. There had been an increase in wages in April and the department, taking that into account, had offered a reduction in rentals of 7 per cent, from the first of that month, subject to the condition that it might be varied in future in accordance with any further general restoration of wages cuts or any reduction in wages.