Staff ‘reluctant' to do overtime

Press, 2 December 1978, Page 20

Staff ‘reluctant' to do overtime

Income tax on overtime is said to be stopping the engineering industry from expanding just when it is startling to “come out of the doldrums.” According to the Canterbury branch of the Engineerng Employers’ Federation, vorkers are reluctant to york overtime because of igh tax rates on extra earnngs. The association is worried hat this could lead to some ■ngineering firms failing to neet project deadlines, and ■aving to make penalty paynents. In spite of signs. that the ■ngineering industry may be •icking up. employers are I •ary of taking on more staff

in case another downturn occurs. Instead. the assistantsecretary of the Canterbury Employers’ Association (Mr C. M. Wishart) said, employers were asking existing staff I to work more overtime. “Employers don’t want to take on extra staff just to lay them off again and pay out something like three weeks redundancy pay to each man,” Mr Wishart said. The president of the federation (Mr I. A. Schumacher) said that the engineering industry was “starting to come out of the doldrums.” "Canterbury’s engineering future looks good, we’re ■ starting to get more work and export contracts are begining to pickup.” he said.