Trains return to schedule

Press, Volume CXII, Issue 33092, 6 December 1972, Page 1

Trains return to schedule

(By our industrial reporter)

;Like many another industrial stoppage, a two-hour railway stop-work meeting at Christchurch yesterday was because of a misunderstanding between employer and workers.

As a result, 200 passengers bound for the south, west and north were delayed two to two and three-quarter hours, and freight was held up for 1 as long as four hours.

The dispute was over the payment to be made to Christchurch workers while on temporary transfer to Kaikoura—the transfer being necessary to cope with the extra rail traffic' generated by the third Cook Strait ferry. (Permanent transfers will be made when houses have been built for the men.) A number of men applied for the temporary transfer believing they would be paid the relieving allowance of $7.93 a day. After being accepted, they were told that instead of this they would

have their hotel board paid and would receive $1 a day for out-of-pocket expenses. As this proposition was less favourable, and certainly would not cover the position of a man who had to keep his board available in Christchurch for his return, the men then refused to accept the transfer. The department suspended them without pay. Their union, the Canterbury branch of the Engineers’, Firemen and Cleaners’ Association, met at 9 a.m. yesterday and decided that none of its members would accept transfer until the dispute was settled. A measure of the feeling aroused was the attendance —all 195 members except for six . who were on holiday or sick.

Although there has been no formal settlement yet, it appears that the suspended men will be returned to duty, in Christchurch, and will .not suffer any loss of pay. It is expected that the relieving positions will then be offered again, on the new-basis.