Motor Apprenticeships Hours Down, Wages Up

Press, Volume CVII, Issue 31409, 30 June 1967, Page 12

Motor Apprenticeships Hours Down, Wages Up

Apprenticeship terms in the tnotor industry have been reduced from 10,000 to 9000 hours, and for an apprentice with school certificate qualifications, from 9000 to 8000 hours, by an order of the Court of Arbitration which came into force on Tuesday. The order, issued by Judge A. P. Blair, after application by the Motor Trades Apprenticeship Committee, will affect about 5000 existing apprenticeship contracts, as well as all future ones. The order also increases wage rates. An apprentice who will serve 9000 hours will be paid from 42 to 90 per cent of the minimum journeyman rates, on a scale of 1000-hour periods, and an apprentice on 8000 hours will be paid from 48 to 90 per cent of such rates.

Previously, the percentage range was from 32 to 77 per cent of journeyman rates for apprentices on 10,000 hours, and from 37 to 77 per cent for those on 9000 hours. An apprentice who has passed the written section of the motor-trade certificate examination will be paid full journeyman rates for the last 1000 hours of his term, or if he passes it, during the last 1000 hours.

Where an apprentice passes the first qualifying examination conducted by the New Zealand Motor

Trade Certification Board his apprenticeship term will be reduced 500 hours, and it will be reduced a further 500 hours on passing the second qualifying examination, from the date of producing notification of success to his employer. Such 500-hour credits, however, will not apply where the apprentice has been granted exemption from one or both of the examinations, or has been granted an aegrotat pass.