POSITION IN CITY

Press, Volume CI, Issue 29765, 7 March 1962, Page 19

POSITION IN CITY

One Man Out Of Work

To date, there was no unemployment among skilled building workers in Canterbury. from Waimate to Kaikoura, said the secretary of the Canterbury Carpenters' and Joiners’ Union (Mr F. L Langley) yesterday. “One bricklayer is at present looking for work, and this is the building trade in which we find it most difficult to place men in work,’’ Mr Langley said. “Throughout the trade there has been a noticeable reduction m the number of hours worked a week, especially in cottage building. The most notable sign of recession is in brick work.”

Last month a firm making bricks in the city gave notice to seven men. The dismissals were because of a fall in the demand for bricks. Mr Langley said that the good number of large building projects in the city last year, such as the railway station, harbour offices and nurses’ home at the Princess Margaret Hospital had helped to absorb skilled men during the slackening in house building.

Many large firms in the city now employed their own permanent maintenance staff and a number of men in his union had steady jobs with such firms. Mr Langley ac’ded. “As far as our union organisation is concerned, we have always maintained that some method of creating stability and long-term planning in the building trade should be established. The building trade is the barometer of the country’s economic soundness and any slump in the building industry has always proved disastrous for both government and people.”

There are about 5000 persons directly employed in the building trade in Canterbury. including 2500 members of the Carpenters' and Joiners' Union, and 887 builders, joinery firms and plasterers. Many of the plumbers, plasterers and carpenters in the industry are contractors, and numerous other tradesmen such as block-makers, electricians and roof-tilers are largely dependent on the industry.