Employment And Oysters

Press, Volume CVIII, Issue 31659, 20 April 1968, Page 12

Employment And Oysters

The secretary of the Canterbury Wholesale Oyster Workers’ Union (Mr L. Lee) deserves to succeed in his efforts to promote the export of oysters; but not merely because a handful of members of his union are out of work or may be out of work. “It might “ be unpopular politically ”, we remarked on February 24, “to allow the export of oysters and to be held “responsible for the subsequent rise in domestic “ prices, but a Government facing a balance-of- “ payments crisis cannot afford to put obstacles in the “ way of an export trade worth $4.5 million a year ”. If the Government is prepared to sacrifice $4.5 million of export income a year to hold down the domestic price of oysters yet permits oysters to be exported because a handful of jobs are threatened, its thinking is even more muddled than its harshest critics have imagined. If this is the measure of its concern over the level of employment, it might ask its advisers how much employment would be created by an extra $4.5 million of export earnings. The motor assembly industry, being characterised by extravagant requirements both of import content and of local labour, would make a useful case study. For $4.5 million this industry could buy the components of about 5000 motor cars—lo per cent of the total imported in 1967. At the height of its prosperity in 1965-66 the motor assembly industry employed more than 4000 workers. Hundreds of them lost their jobs last year, and the fear of redundancy hangs over many still employed in the industry. At the most conservative estimate, potential redundancy in the motor assembly industry must be 10 times that in the wholesale oyster industry. At its lowest, vote-catching, level, the question might be phrased for politicians in the following form; is there more political kudos to be gained from keeping oysters down to 25c a dozen, or from increasing imports of motor cars (or some other commodity) by $4.5 million?