New Immigration System “Big Step Forward”

Press, Volume CIX, Issue 32274, 17 April 1970, Page 12

New Immigration System “Big Step Forward”

(N.Z. Pres? Association)

WELLINGTON, April 16. New Zealand’s new immigration system was a tremendous step forward and was already bringing results in increased migrant inquiries and applications, the retiring Secretary of Labour (Mr N. S. Woods), said today. Because employers seeking labour overseas were required by the Government to put in one quarter of the cost, this made the scheme selfregulating, and gave einployi ers a direct and vitally important link with the migrant, he said.

Mr Woods will retire at the end' of this month. In September he will become visiting fellpw in industrial relations at Victoria University of Wellington. “The employer contributes to the scheme an amount about equal to what he would spend in New Zealand advertising for labour,” Mr Woods said. “This would probably bring a nil result.” Because the employer was paying for the labour to come out, he had more interest in the worker and would only bring out a man he required,) Mr Woods said. This took a great deal of the administrative work out of the Govern-!

ment’s hands, thus reducing the over-all cost of the project. Causes Of Unrest He said there were three main causes of industrial unrest in New Zealand at the moment. They were suddenly escalating prices, the conservative attitude of the Court of Arbitration, and an era of unprecedented flux and change in so many fields of industry. “We have got a sudden escalation of prices," he said. “You always get a rash of industrial trouble in association with any steep rise in the cost of living.” Problems of industrial relations were those of employer and worker, or of employers’ organisations and unions, he said. As the Minister of Labour (Mr Marshall) had said recently, the Government could not act as a labour policeman.