WATERFRONT STOPPAGE

Press, Volume XCVIII, Issue 28819, 13 February 1959, Page 8

WATERFRONT STOPPAGE

Union To Discuss Wage Claim

<Km> Zealana Prut Association*

WELLINGTON. February 12. Waterside workers in Wellington will stop work tomorrow morning to discuss the breakdown of negotiations between their national union and their employers to settle a union claim for a new wage rise.

The claim is for a wage increase of 9d an hour. The employers are understood to have tejected the claims on the grounds that it is not in the national interest, coming at a time when the country's economy is being kept as stable as possible.

Mr T. G. Wells, president of the Wellington ' Waterside Workers’ Union, confirmed tonight that the meeting was being held, but he declined to comment on it. Asked why the matter of the breakdown in negotiations had not been dealt with by members at the regular monthly stop-work meeting on the Wellington waterfront today, Mr Wells said that meeting had decided to deal with the matter at another meeting. The secretary of the North Island Association of Waterside Workers, Mr J. E. Napier, said it would not be proper for him to comment on a Wellington union meeting. The wage case was a national matter, but he did not know of any nation-wide stopwork meetings tomorrow.

Union leaders tonight discounted suggestions .that after the meeting work would stop for the day, and possibly, on Saturday too. They said any courses of action would be determined only by the members at the meeting. _ The dispute will now go to the waterfront Industry Tribunal. It is expected to be heard on February 26.