EARNINGS OF SHIP’S OFFICER

Dominion, Volume 31, Issue 287, 31 August 1938, Page 6

EARNINGS OF SHIP’S OFFICER

Argument In Arbitration Court By Telegraph—Press Association. Auckland, August 30. The value as board and lodgings of the accommodation and meals provided on a ship for an officer was argued in the Arbitration Court during the hearing of a claim by a widow for £lOOO compensation for the death of her husband. The assessment of the value of his employment was the only point in dispute. Plaintiff was Gladys Margaret Watts and defendant Alexander Frederick Watchlin, master mariner trading as the Watchlin Line. Mr. Moody, for plaintiff, said plaintiff was the widow of Roy Douglas Watts, second officer on the Port Waikato, who was drowned near Jack’s Point, four miles south of Timaru, on August 3, 1937, when he fell overboard while assisting in the dumping of dunnage. The weekly earnings of Watts, calculated in accordance with the provisions of the Workers’ Compensation Act, 1922, were £6/7/6 a week. Captain William John Keane, secretary of the Auckland section of the Merchant Service Guild and formerly Government surveyor of ships in Auckland and Wellington, said £1 a week was the accepted allowance for keep on a ship of the Port Waikato’s class. AS on other vessels much food was wasted owing to the system followed. It was not the fault of the men. The defence denied that Watts’s weekly earnings had been £6/7/4 a week and contended they were in excess of £8 a week.

William Gerald Carstens, senior Clerk of the Northern Steamship Company, Limited, agents for the Watchlin Line, said the cost of providing the Port Waikato per man per year, including cooking, was £lOO. By the award an officer on shore was allowed 5/6 a day for accommodation. John Woodward Lowe, in charge of the provldorlng department of the Northern Steamship Company, Limited, gave evidence of the quality, of the food supplied to the Port Waikato. On some occasions, he said, the provisions included nuts and cream Mr. Justice O’Regan: This ease might have very serious complications. I have acted In cases where £1 a week has been the accepted scale. Tt will put a lot of seamen workers’ compensation cases out of court. The court reserved its decision.