Mr Sides told lie must have a person

Press, 18 June 1980, Page 1

Mr Sides told lie must have a person

A Christchurch garage owner, Mr E. C. Sides, has again run foul of the Human Rights Commission Act.

Mr Sides said he had telephoned the Labour Department yesterday to offer short-term work for a girl, aged 16 to 18, cleaning cars. • ' He was told . that he could not ask for a girl. The department would only send someone to the job if he asked for a person. “It is ludicrous.” said Mr Sides, who is fighting the Human Rights Commission Act over his advertisement for staff. “They must have hundreds of girls on their books, but no-one gets the job,” he said. Mr Sides said he had not been thinking of his previous battles over the act, and had not been trying to provoke the Labour Department. “I am paying the wages; the job suits a girl; so I asked for a girl. I told them that if they sent a man round I would send him back,” Mr Sides said. The department refused to send anyone, and Mr Sides intends to advertise the po.siti n on Radio Rhema.

The Labour Department’s assistant district superintendent in Christchurch (Mr G. D. Postlethwaite) said yesterday that the department had to work according to the Human Rights Commission Act.