HOUSE PASSES SHOPS BILL

Press, Volume XCII, Issue 27794, 20 October 1955, Page 14

HOUSE PASSES SHOPS BILL

Unusual Debate On Third Reading PROTEST BY MR NASH

(From Our Parliamentary Reporter) WELLINGTON. October 19.

Without a division being taken, and after a debate lasting an hour, the Shops and Offices Bill was given a third reading and passed by the House of Representatives this evening. Tlie third-reading debate was unusual, the Leader of the Opposition (Mr Nash) setting out the reasons for amendments moved in the committee stages. These, he said, had been automatically defeated because the Government had told its members to oppose any changes. If that was democracy. said Mr Nash, the difference between democracy and dictatorship was a shadow. In their hearts, members of the Opposition agreed with the bill, replied the Minister of Labour (Mr W. Sullivan). What was being done was in the interests of the great majority of consumers, and the interests of traders were being watched. The legislation was desirable, timely, and widely accepted throughout the country. Mr Nash, as reported by the Press Association, said that the Opposition had a general objection to any unnecessary extension of Sunday trading, though it agreed that week-end facilities should be made available for visitors to resorts and camps. The Opposition believed that the enforcement of the provisions of the bill should remain with the police, and not be transferred to the Department of Labour. The sale of petrol and other supplies should be on a roster system, and there should be no extension of the list of goods that could be sold after hours at the discretion of the Minister.

The Opposition had protested against the lowering of the age of employment for newspaper and milk-delivery boys, and objected to the raising of allowable hours of overtime to be worked in a year by female assistants from 60 to 120. and to the power given to the Minister to increase that figure to 200. All the Opposition’s amendments had been defeated by the party machine without regard to the improvements they would make to the bill, said Mr Nash. “The Opposition will let the third reading go through because there are certain things it wants to happen,” he said.

In reply, the Minister said that Opposition amendments to the bill had not been accepted by the Government because they were destructive and were designed to undermine what the Government had set out to do—to rectify a situation which had grown up over a period of years and which the Labour Government had made no attempt to remedy. Evidence had been heard by the Labour Bills Committee, and amendments to the draft bill had been made only after careful consideration. The amendments made by the Government to the draft bill had been put before the committee and agreed to, said the Minister. Matters of overtime and tea money were the concern of industrial awards.