Reassurance given on forestry jobs

Press, 27 January 1987, Page 3

Reassurance given on forestry jobs

The member of Parliament for the West Coast, Mr Kerry Burke, repeated the assurance of the Prime Minister, Mr Lange, that all wage workers would still have a job after March 31, when he met forestry workers at Reefton on Saturday.

Mr Burke met the forestry staff before a meeting of the Labour Electorate Committee in the town.

The committee secretary, Mrs Tina Sims, said that “forestry workers expressed their views on the present situation and gave Mr Burke further points to take up with officials in Wellington.” “While the meeting did not resolve any of the uncertainties currently faced by forestry workers, it did provide a further opportunity for them to present their views to the

one man best able to argue their case at a high level,” said Mrs Sims.

Mr Burke had outlined his activities on behalf of the forestry workers, and repeated the Prime Minister’s assurance that all wage workers would still have a job on April 1.

Meanwhile, 12 permament jobs in the Forest Service on the West Coast have so far been identified as being surplus as from March 31.

The 12 jobs, from throughout the Westland conservancy, are part of the 282 jobs which have been identified nationwide as not fitting into the new agencies which will replace both the Forest Service and Department of Lands and Survey. The P.S.A. delegate in the Forest Service, Mr Gus Buckley, yesterday

said that he believed the figure of 12 surplus jobs conservative.

Forestry staff in Christchurch will meet a Forestry Corporation board member, Mrs Beverley Adlam, this morning to discuss the potential for private enterprise within the new organisation.

Mrs Adlam, who was the 1986 Business Woman of the Year for her work in starting small businesses in Kawerau, has been touring New Zealand to discuss the feasibility of schemes by staff made redundant under the new corporation.

It was announced in November that more than half of the 170 forestry management staff in Canterbury would lose their jobs.

Mrs Adlam will meet workers in Hokitika this afternoon.