Wages policy talks may be wrecked

Press, 12 April 1980, Page 1

Wages policy talks may be wrecked

PA Wellington Record inflation and Remuneration Act regulations could wreck the Government’s plans to talk to the Federation.- of Labour and the Employers’ Federation about a wages policy.. ' The president of the F.O.L. (Mr J. W. Knox) last evening called for an immediate interim wage increase and said the federation would convene an urgent meeting with the Combined State Unions. Earlier yesterday he had asked the Minister of Labour (Mr Bolger) to withdraw the regulations which, last November reduced a chemical handling allowance for storemen and packers. “How the heir can you freely negotiate with regulations applying as you are negotiating?” he said to reporters. A failure to lift . the regulations could see the F.O.L. reconsidering its decision to attend the talks on April-24, said Mr Knox. Mr Knox said the storemen wanted the regulations removed before they renegotiated their award later this year. “They don’t want it hanging over them, nor do their employers, but we did not get much joy from the Minister, so there is a

possibility it might affect our meeting,” he said. Mr Bolger’s reaction to the threat was a low-key one, however. . He said he was quite confident the mood of the meeting was different from what Mr Knox told reporters afterward. Mr Bolger gave no undertaking that the Government would make any move on the regulations which cut the allowance for . handling dangerous chemicals from $6.40 a week to $l.BO. On Wednesday he said the Government was not prepared to make a cost-of-living order “at this time.” If that remains the Government position on April 24 even the lifting of the regulations may not be enough to get the Government’s tripartite talks under way. Mr Knox said inflation was-out of control; which made a cost-of-living adjustment imperative. The F.O.L. would convene an urgent meeting with the C.S.U. to start a joint campaign for an immediate increase, The campaign would be separate from the wage policy talks planned for April 24, he said. “Those talks are on broad policy issues which will take time to finalise — relief from the current

situation is urgent and cannot await the outcome of those talks.

“In the absence of any proper guidelines on cost-of-living adjustments we are pressing for an urgent interim adjustment ncnv.”

Mr Knox said he had predicted last June that inflation would top 18 per cent, and he dismissed any suggestion that the recent tax cuts could compensate for rising prices. “They represent a 1.3 per cent increase in takehome pay for a worker on $l5O a week — $1.57 a week.”

The 30 per cent sugar price rise would add 1 per cent to household budgets and other food prices had risen to unprecedented levels, he said. The chairman of the C.S.U. (Mr D. H. Thorp) could not be reached last evening but earlier yesterday he sharply criticised Mr Bolger for not allowing the C.S.U. to take part in the April 24 talks. The C.S.U. represented a third of the work-force and its members were vitally affected, Mr Thorp said.

If the Government maintained its stand it could not expect C.S.U. co-operation in any policy that might emerge, he said.