HUNTLY COAL STRIKE

Press, Volume LXXXV, Issue 25924, 3 October 1949, Page 8

HUNTLY COAL STRIKE

' —<♦►— SETTLEMENT OFFER ACCEPTED WORK TO BE RESUMED TO-DAY The 1500 Huntly miners who have been on strike because of a dispute at the Wilton State mine will resume work this morning. This was announced by the Minister of Mines (Mr A. McLagan) on Saturday. Mr McLagan said that the Northern Miners’ Union executive had accepted his offer of a settlement. The dispute arose over the employment of a worker on a coal-cutting machine working on pillars. The Wilton miners claimed he was insufficiently experienced for the work and that it endangered his life, and other Huntly miners came out in sympathy. “After discussions yesterday afternoon with the president of the Northern Miners’ Union (Mr T. Hall), 1 made the following offer to the union for the settlement of the dispute at the Wilton mine.’’ said the Minister on Saturday. “If the union agrees that the dispute is on a question of safety, end it considers it unsafe for the machine man concerned to be employed on the cutting machine in a pillar place, and that the dispute can be settled by taking him out of the pillar place and putting him into a solid place under the supervision of an experienced miner, and replacing him in the pillar place by an experienced miner, I will agree to do so on condition that work is resumed at all mines in the Waikato district on Monday morning.” Mr Hall had agreed to place the proposal before his executive as soon as they could be called together and to advise him of their decision, said the Minister. “I have just been informed that the union executive met this morning in Huntly and carried the following resolution: ‘That this executive committee is of the opinion that the Minister’s offer in the Wilton dispute meets the wishes of this executive as far as the safety issue is concerned. We recommend our members to resume work on Monday, October 3. and refer the question of cavilling truckers and any other anomalies to an immediate conference of representatives of the union, the district mine managers, and the Mines Department.’ ’’