PREMIUM BONUS SYSTEM

Dominion, Volume 1, Issue 235, 27 June 1908, Page 14

PREMIUM BONUS SYSTEM

THE MOULDERS' DISPUTE, 'AMERICAN COMPETITION IN ! MACHINERY. (BX TSIZOBAPH.—fIPICIiL COBBMPOKDHHT.) . ' ; Chrlstohuroh, Juno 25. • The premium bains 1 system has ' been be-' fore the Arbitration Court 'in the moulders', dispute. A number of. the witnesses were' employees of' Booth and Mac Donald,_ the head of which,firm,(Mr. G. T., Booth), introduced the premium system! and-is a great believer iri its.efficacy.' At the outset of the case Mr. Thorn (for the Union) said.they were prepared to accept the hours, wages, and overtime in the Auckland award, and # the apprentice, and > preference conditions in the Union's . old award.; They asked that piecework, sub-contracting and premium bonus work should' be pro-' -hibited. He called one of the firm of , Soott Bros., ironfounders (Mr. J. L. Scott), who stated that he believed in straight-out, piecework rather than the premium bonus system, ibecause pieoework permitted of equal pay for equal work. •■ ' - Alexander Burgess, moulder, employed at Booth and Mac Donald's, said ne had worked ' under the premium bonus system for twelve months. For a fortnight he was making flax stripper* chairs and earned 2s. or 33. extra. 'At other w.ork, he. had under the. system got ss. extra one week, 6s. another week, and 9s. another week, though, the same amount of work had been done. _ J. Keir (manager for.P. ; and D. Duncan), in reply to Mr/Booth j said under piecework his fiim got double the amount of work out of the men for a little extra, pay. The pressure of the competition from the International Harvester Company and the Massey Harris Co, was increasing in intensity.~ The 'Act passed to protect machinery and imple-. ■ment manufacturers had been a perfect fraudi • George H. Edwards, fitter, employed by Booth and Mac Donald, said that under the premium bonus system the time for a job had been reduced'from 25 to 14 minutes. The improvements, made did not, compensate for the reduction made in time. To Mr. Booth: He made Is., an hour under the old system. He made 2s. an hour bonus in addition to his wages. He now Bade - ls. an _ hour bonus. Ho considered this fairly •satisfactory, and was not complaining. Patrick Noonan, moulder, employed .by Scott Bros., sated that he had worked for fourteen or fifteen' years in Massachusetts, U.S.A. He had nover heard of the premium bonus system there. They worked a ninehours' day for 2 dols. 75 cents a day (about lis.). They'turned' out moro work per hour in America than in New Zealand, as, the methods were radically different. It was not because thp men worked harder,, but there were more facilities .for quick work. In reply to' th'e president, Mr. Scott,, said • that the reason the Canterbury employers could not give the same rates of pay as the employers in Auckland was that the Canterbury employers produced work which came into competition with imported goods,. whilst the work done in Auckland was jobbing. work 1 chiefly, and the employers could recover from their cusomers the cost of the labour. The, 1 employers . were willing to accept the provisions of the Auckland award as to overtime, preference and,apprentices.On behalf of the employers, John Burgessi foreman moulder to Booth, Mac Donald and Co., and Chas. G. Whittaker, Works Manager of the samo firm, gave evidence regarding the premium bonus system. The moulders had not entered whole-heartedly into the system, an(3 the increased - wages earned had been only about 4 per cent.' 1 whilst the blacksmiths had earned about 14 percent.

Fred Cooper, of Cooper and Duncan, Ltd., stated that his firm had increased moulders' ■wages, from ,0s,!; to* 10s. per day, .because'he thought' that there was some dissatisfaction among the men, and he thought he would weed out those not worth the higher rate. The iitiplements;we_re sold at catalogue prices which were at/ a limit'now, and it was impossible to. recover any increased cost inproduction. At present he got £47 for a 15 Coulter drill,'which , was a higher price than that charged for the imported article, and the increased wages would mean an increased cost of 10s. Drills made in the Dominion could not be sold at the samo price as those imported, on which there was no duty, whilst if the material were imported, ho would have to pay £1. He quoted figures to show • that the increased importations had been largely in excess of the increased local .manufactures. As an indication that tho cost of production was too high, he quoted a Government circular to the effect that it had been decided not to accept any tenders for 'points)and ; crossings.';,lt had icost about £20 to prepare the tenders. Pno condition of the'contract was that the minimum wage fixed by the 'Court should bo paid.

John Lee Scott, "of Scott 8r03., stated that there were dozens of articles that were imported that could be ' mado locally' if piecework was introduced, arid wages were not increased. ; •

iG. T. Booth, ; managing, director of Booth Mac Donald arid Co., state'd that on September 1 he spent the greater part of -the day in the moulding shop of an. American plough factor}', and saw several nren making ploughshares similar to ' ibe ono 'produced. Thp piecework price'for each share was one cent (ono halfpenny) with a bonus of a quarter of a cent for any made in excess of the standard, the Standard'being>2oo'per day of .nirie_ hours. The men would be moulding from six and a half to seven hours, aria working in a .temperature ranging from 95 to 100 degrees in the shade, conditions that never obtained in New Zealand;; The American workers were not so intelligent" as the New Zealand-worker, yet when witness introduced certain machines in order that his employees should ho able to do, something liko the amount of work done in America! they would not, or could not, begin to do the work. The moulding cost in America was ud. per cwt., as compared with '2s'.' 4d. in New Zealand. . ; ■ *, ' -

Iho greatest number of similar shares'that any of tho witnesses examined the previous day . had .'stated could be made in one "dav was 60. i

This closed the case for tho employers. l Mr. Booth addressed tho Court, and defended the premium system. Industrially, he said, the only virtuo was efficiency; arid thei L Only vice ineiDciency,, consequently, any method designed to increase efficiency could not be immoral. r

THE ADDRESSES! . ' (BI TELEGRAPH —PKESS ASSOCIATION.) „ „ ■ ■ Christehuroh, June 25. - Mr. G. T. Booth's address.to .the Arbitration Court yesterday in tho moulders' dispute dealt to a large extent with the premium bonus system, a 'trial of which was made; in Messrs. Booth and Macdonald's implement manufactory in this city. Mr. Booth's main contention was that the' system made for tho higher efficiency of the worker, and .he held that it was .in operation fairer to the worker than the piece-work system, .under which the worker was liable to have the prices' fpr, piece reduced. He strongly urged that if the implement manufacturers of the Dominion intended to'successfully compete against imported implements and machinery, such a system as the premium bonus system, and the most modern foundry machinery, must be introduced. Referring to the | contention of the representative of the Union! (Mr. Thorn) that the workers of the Dominion were opposed to the Americanisation of industrial methods, Mr. Booth said that tho premium bonus system was not of American origin, but had been'and.was in uso'in engineering shops in England and Scotland. He drew tho Court's attention to tho remarks made on tho system by an authority on industrial efficiency, and also supplied, the Court with a number of extracts from American iron, trade journals, giving opinions of the working of the system. Mr. Thorn, in reply,..contended that,instead of tho premium bonus system the employer should pay for work done in excess of the standard amount allotted within a given time at overtime rates, arguing that the employer, by being saved the oxpense of supervision and the wear and tear of machin ery that would be incurred if overtime were worked, could well afford to 1 pay those rates. The President of the Court (Mr. Justice Sim) was of opinion that this would'not be sufficient to induce employers to reward efficiency, and laid stress on the fact that the inducements should not ho all in favour of tho woiker. The employer must be given some inducement to reward efficiency. 4