WATERSIDE DISPUTE

Evening Post, Volume CI, Issue 49, 26 February 1921, Page 6

WATERSIDE DISPUTE

CONFERENCE HELD TO-DAY FEDERATION TO REPLY NEXT WEEK. It is impossible to say as yet whether (he prospects for a resumption of work en the waterfront are bright or other-,-wise. The only thing that seems quite clear is the determination of the employers not to depart from the attitude revealed in their 'statement made on Thursday, 17th inst. The essence of that statement was in the final paragraph, .which read:— . ■ " "This position of affairs has become bo acute that the employers have now finally decided that they can no longer tolerate it, and instructions have bee" issued to-day to the ports at the moment concerned that if the refusal to work in accordance with the terms of the agreement is persisted in, no further engagements of labour will be made until a satisfactory guarantee is, given by the federation and the unions that the normal conduct of the work of the ships •will be resumed and maintained. This is a drastic remedy, which, if carried into effect, will entail very serious delay to ships, and throw a very large number of waterside workers out of employment, but the men themselves, and their unions, will be solely responsible for the bringing about of such 4 situation." _ ■■"In accordance with the suggestion made by the employers when the local Disputes Committee met on Thursday, there was a conference to-day between representatives of the employ ore and representatives of the Waterside Workers' Federation. ■ Very' little information ihas bean given as to tiie proceedings. Following is the official report, ■ made by the employers :—

A meeting was held this morning between representatives of this waterfront employersl and the Waterside Workers' Federation. ■ The representatives of the employers asked the federation for an'assurance that this work on the- waterfront will, in future, be carried on uninterruptedly, arid in accordance with the full terms of the agreement. - ■ The • federation's reply is expected early next week.

As the federation failed, to give the) required assurance at to-day's conference, the shipping hold-up will -continue. Each day the position is becoming more serious. If a settlement is not reached within a few. days, it is feared that a large number of men will be thrown out of employment. As it is, nearly a thousand watorsiders in Wellinigton alone are idle, and the notice to drivers will expire on Tuesday.. .

The omission _ of a word altered the een6e of a paragraph in Mr. W. H. G. Bennett's letter to Mr. Roberts, published in last-night's Post. The reference to a sitting of the Auckland Disputes Committee should have Tead, a 6 under :—"At Auckland the matter of men refusing to work overtime was brought before the local committee on the 7th instant, when the xinion's representatives, while not denying the fact, maintained during discussion that it was not .through any instruction issued by;the executive of the union, but that it was due to the members' individual action, over which the union had no control."