APPROVAL OF WAGE INCREASES

Press, Volume LXXVI, Issue 23131, 21 September 1940, Page 12

APPROVAL OF WAGE INCREASES

POWERS OF ELECTRICITY CONTROLLER (PfiESS ASSOCIATION TELECBAiI.) _ DUNEDIN, September 20. The Dunedin City Council has received a communication from the Electricity Controller advising that any increases in salary to men receiving more than £4OO a year must be submitted to him for approval. The communication follows the council’s decision to give all its employees, whether governed by awards or not, the benefit of the general order made by the Arbitration Court.

Since the outbreak of war last year the Electricity Controller has been given a fairly large measure of supervision in the electrical industry, and the powers vested in him include the right to govern the wages paid in that industry. Not only the City Council, but all power boards and municipal councils In the Dominion, and, in fact, all branches of the electrical industry come under his supervision. Moreover, the necessity for obtaining the permission of the controller to give increases in salary to men earning more than £4OO a year, applies to all increments to which such employees may be entitled.

The City Council has not yet replied to the controller’s request, as the matter has not come before its finance committee, wnich may submit the whole question to the full council. The council had a previous communication from the controller on the subject of electrical control, but this apparently was not taken very seriously.