LABOUR LAWS

Press, Volume LXXIII, Issue 22111, 5 June 1937, Page 20

LABOUR LAWS

! TO THE EDITOB OF THE Ptt’SS ! Sir—l wish to thank Mr R. T Bailey f for his information that the stalls and I refreshments rooms trading on railway stations are exempt from the provisions lof the Shops and Offices Act and the trade awards in respect to hours of tradhas, however, failed to answer my major points, so X will put them again. (1) If the Labour Department can quote no legal authority as to what constitutes the stock-in-trade of a grocer, how can it successfully prosecute any shopkeeper, other than those cited under the award, for selling what is generally considered grocers’ stock? (2) Does the department. I rule that tea. canned and bottled food, honey jellv crystals, soaps, and culinary essences are grocers’ lines? if yes, then on what authority? I I am not trying to embarrass the department by my questions, rather to help it* because I realise that overlapping in trades and consequent after-hour tradung, are bound to continue as long as we have a multiplicity of closing hours, and dili ferent sets of wages for assistants. If a grocer, cited under the award, nas to pav £5 to his male assistant and close liis shop at 5.30 p.m., why should his next-door neighbour, who trades under the title of fruiterer, be allowed to sell similar goods, with cheaper labour, after 5.30 p.m. and up to 11 p.m., including Saturdays and sometimes Sundays?— -Yours, etc.. oid GROCER _ j June 3. 1937. | [Mr R. T. Bailey, Officer in Charge of the Labour Department, said that the answer to “Old Grocer's” letter would appear in the Court columns to-day, where it would be found that the Labour Department had brought 47 prosecutions for offences of the type mentioned.!