Wool-testing dispute to get early hearing

Press, 23 February 1987, Page 1

Wool-testing dispute to get early hearing

The Wool Testing Authority dispute, which is nearing the end of its third month, is headed for an early hearing before the Arbitration Court.

The parties have been told the dispute will be heard in Wellington on March 17, much sooner than the Public Service Association expected.

The P.S.A. feared that the drawn-out picketing would be followed by a drawn-out legal dispute, but instead there will be only a month between the failed conciliation talks and the court hearing. The Canterbury regional secretary of the P.S.A., Mr John McKenzie, said the association had applied to the Court to be a party to the hearing. The Court had now ruled that the P.S.A. could be a party, he said. No decision had yet been made on whether P.S.A. officials from Christchurch or Wellington would put the case.

Mr McKenzie said he thought the early hearing had been granted because the Court realised it was a dispute that needed to be resolved quickly. The Wool Testing Authority had forced the matter to the Court by filing a case for conciliation to have the Woollen Workers’ Union take over coverage instead of the P.S.A. That conciliation hearing took place in Christchurch a week ago but the union, which had said it was not interested in having coverage of the , wool-testing workers, ' failed to appear. The industrial conciliator, Mr Brian Gray, referred the dispute to the Arbitration Court, where the union is also not expected to participate.

That will leave the two parties before the Court: the Wool Testing Authority and the P.S.A. The picketing workers were at the Trade Union

Centre in Christchurch on Friday evening when three local members- of Parliament had talks with local P.S.A. and Combined State Union officials. When the meeting ended, the Minister of Trade and Industry, Mr Caygill, who is member of Parliament for St Albans, and the member of Parliament for Sydenham, Mr Jim Anderton, stayed to talk to the strikers. Mr McKenzie said “nothing definite” had come out of the session. The P.S.A. was now preparing a background paper for Mr Caygill, and the striking workers would arrange to meet him at his electorate office on Saturday, or the Saturday after.

The dispute began in early December when the Wool Testing Authority refused to acknowledge State linkage for its staff pay rates, an agreement the P.S.A. said was several years old.