WORK AND WAGES.

Dominion, Volume 5, Issue 1281, 9 November 1911, Page 4

WORK AND WAGES.

♦ THE SEAMEN'S DISPUTE. CONFERENCE ADJOURNED. Everybody who is in tho least degree interested in shipping has been looking forward for weeks past to tho conference of tho shipowners and tho seamen's representatives about tho demands recently mado by the men on deck and in tho stokehold for better wages and better conditions of work. What these demands aro has not yet been declared. Tho coni'erenco was opened yesterday in n committee room in the Town Hall, but after a few minutes of disagreement it adjourned. The first point of contention arose very early—it was as to who should bo chairman. It was finally agreed that Mr. P. Hally, Conciliation Commissioner, should preside, and that tho conference adjourn and resumo to-day. Tho meeting yesterday was never really properly constituted. No chairman was elected, and no roll of representatives was called. Tho seamen were represented by Messrs. W. Belcher , (general secretary), D. J. Munro (secretary to tho Auckland branch), D. Donovan (president of tho Executive Council), and W. T. Vouiiff (secretary of tho Wellington branch). Tho employers were represented by a number of gentlemen who are not yet known even to one another. They aro delegates from tho deep-sea corapnnies who havo their headquarters in London, from tho Union Company, which runs .most of tho shipping on these coasts, and from a number of 6mallcr companies and individual owners who control small steamers or sailers plying from port ■to port in New Zealand. Tho demands of tho New Zealand Seamen's Union arc for increases which aro considerable, and in case of accident they have cancelled their registration, under tho Arbitration Court. About their conference yesterday uo news is available, the delegates from both sides having entered into an undertaking to tell nothing to newspaper men. It ie understood, however, that they want more wages and better working conditions. COASTAL SHIPPING. STEAMERS RUNNING AGAIN. Sinco tho owners havo settled their differences with tho officers on the steamers in the coastal trade, no time has been lost in putting tho vessels in commission. The services which havo suflercd most by the deadlock are those to >yangonm and Patca, and to those a deal ot attention will bo paid for a day or two until tho surplus of freight has boon worked off. Steamers will run to Blenheim, Kaikoura, Nelson, and the West Coast at once, nnd most of tho steamers to serve ports on theso trades wero got awny yesterday. Presently things will bo normal again, and tho railway will suiler loss, by reduction of cargoo on goods trains, especially those which run into Wellington very lab at night.