ELECTRICAL WIRING

Dominion, Volume 24, Issue 291, 4 September 1931, Page 2

ELECTRICAL WIRING

Training' Apprentices CITY COUNCIL SYSTEM An appeal made by the Electrical Trades Union in the Arbitration Court yesterday indicated that the union, while not complaining of the training in electrical wiring given by the electricity department of the Wellington City Council, considered that the apprentices should be trained in other electrical work under the control of the department, and so given wider experience. Mr. Justice Frazer presided, with him being Mr. W. Cecil Prime, employers’ nominee, and Mr. A. L. Monteith, workers’ nomiuce. The Electrical Trades Apprentices Committee had decided that the City Council should be granted four extra apprentices to the electrical wiring branch of the electricity department, and the union appealed against that decision on the ground that the City Council refused to train its apprentices on other electrical facilities under its control which would be the means of giving wider experience to them. Mr. 11. E. Swindell, for the union, said the boys received no mechanical training and rarely saw anything of repair work. The training was not as wide as that given by some private firms. Mr. E. Gilmore, for the Apprenticeship Committee, said it was considered that the facilities were adequate for the training of the apprentices, and provided more than the average training. Mr. G. Lauchlan, assistant general manager of the electricity department of the City Council, said Mr. Swindell apparently wanted the boys to be trained as-electrical engineers, but the percentage of boys with the ability required was very small. Five years was the period of training for wiremen, and even after that period only about 25 per cent, passed the wiremen’s examination. The number of boys trained in the department who passed the examination was a little higher than the Dominion average. Wiring, meter mechanics, armature winding, etc., were different branches of the electrical trade requiring special training. Boys who showed special aptitude and desired to get on, did get on. It had been suggested that the apprentices to wiring should get some training in the tram department, but that was an entirely different organisation. Substation work was high tension work, requiring men with special training, ns they had to deal with anything from 6000 to 11,000 volts. The department miist reserve the right to select boys for training in the higher branches of the trade. Two witnesses were called by the department, one as to the nature, of the special training required and given in the department’s workshops, and another, an electrical tradesman, who said he had apprenticed his son with the department to learn electrical wiring, as he was satisfied that the training was pood. His Honour said the onus of proof was on the appellant to show that the committee had made an error, and that would have to be on the lines that the City Council did not train its apprentices as outside employers trained their apprentices. No evidence had been given to show that it did not do so. while the court had the statement of the department thnt it did give the boys a training equal to that of other employers. The appeal could not be allowed.