Bill Not Intended To Ban ‘Shouting’

Press, Volume CIX, Issue 32019, 20 June 1969, Page 26

Bill Not Intended To Ban ‘Shouting’

(New Zealand Press Association) PALMERSTON NORTH, June 19. The anti-tipping bill, the Licensed Premises Gratuities Bill, would not prohibit “shouting” or the giving or receiving of gifts, the instigator of the bill, Mr J. A. Walding, member of Parliament for Palmerston North, said today.

In answer to a statement by the national secretary of the Hotel Workers’ Federation, Mr G. Armstrong, Mr Walding said it was incorrect to say that the bill would stop the buying of drinks by customers for employees, or the giving of gifts to employees, or the receipt of gifts by employees, ‘The bill simply seeks to prohibit the soliciting or accepting of cash gratuities for normal services rendered in licensed premises,” said Mr Walding. “Mr Armstrong must be a lone figure among union lead-:

ers if he wants to see the continuation of a system that in the long run must adversely affect the wage level of the workers he represents. “Rather than advocate the perpetration of a system that makes a section of the workers he represents' dependent on tips for a decent wage, I suggest that he should be seeking their abolition and replacement with a fixed minimum rate that ensures that reasonable earnings are theirs, as of right, and not dependent on discretionary favours, a right just about every other New Zealand : worker enjoys,” he said.