Liquor Price Rise Effects Feared

Press, Volume CVI, Issue 31316, 11 March 1967, Page 3

Liquor Price Rise Effects Feared

(New Zealand Press Association)

DUNEDIN, Mar. 10. The Government would try to impose further taxation on liquor when Parliament resumed and this must result in widespread unemployment in the industry because of buyer resistance to higher prices, says the secretary of the Otago Hotel, Hospital, Restaurant and Related Trades Union of Workers.

In a circular to members, the secretary (Mr D. C. McDonald) said this had been shown dramatically in the resistance to the price of cakes. Staff in that industry were laid off immediately because of a falT in demand.

In Dunedin a serious position already existed because of the price war and it was important that “any further attacks on the industry be prevented in order that a general collapse of employment may be avoided.” The national management committee of the Hotel Workers’ Federation had directed

that bar managers, barmen, barmaids, porter-barmen, porters, stewards, lounge stewards, cellarmen and bottle store hands attend the stopwork meeting called by the Federation of Labour for Tuesday morning. Any victimisation of workers because of attendance at the protest meeting, or failure of any workers to agree to the federation’s request, would be viewed “very seriously and appropriate action taken immediately,” said Mr McDonald.