Goose flesh galls girls

Press, 29 May 1978, Page 1

Goose flesh galls girls

Striptease artists at the Pink Pussycat Club in Christchurch went on a wildcat strike on Saturday night, forcing the club to cloe it doors before midnight. The girls walked off after complaining about their working conditions. They said that it was too cold on stage. But help is on its way.

The club’s owner, Mr J. S. Nicholson, said from Auckland last evening that big electric fan heaters had been ordered and were on their way to Christchurch to be installed at the club.

He said that the old gas heaters had been removed during extensive renovations in the summer. The girls did have heaters in their changing room, and they were on stage for only “two or three minutes at a time” he said.

The president of the Christchurch branch of Actors’ Equity (Mr G. A. Bahlam) said last evening that had the girls contacted him he would have been “delighted” to take up their case on their behalf, even though they are not members of the union.

He quoted the 1978 Actors’, Actresses’, and Related Performers’ Award which said that employers had a duty to ensure that the performance areas were “adequately heated,” as far as practicable. It is compulsory under the award for striptease performers to join the union, but Mr Bahlam said that the union’s policy had never been to force people to join.

He hoped that they would want to join once they realised the benefits.

The union was at present looking at conditions in strip clubs in Auckland with a view to improvements, he said.