WATERSIDE EMPLOYMENT

Evening Post, Volume CV, Issue 111, 11 May 1923, Page 7

WATERSIDE EMPLOYMENT

TO THE EDITOR. Sir, —No country in the world up to the present has so far been able to evolve any scheme to cure the evils thai arise from casual employment, and it is certainly too much to expect a city like j Wellington, and the snipping industry in particular, to solve the problem. First, let me say no serious thought or consideration has been given to the problem, with, perhaps, one notable exception, an address published by you of Sir John Findlay on '' Casual Labour : Its Waste and Remedy," in th~e " Evening Post " of 11th November, 1913.

The watersiders have turned down the scheme, but, guided by no altruistic motives whatever, unless liberty, and freedom can be classed under that head. Well, Sir, thejr turned it down because they think as casual workers they should work for any" employer at any time during the seventy hours of any week; and tljat the Arbitration Court and all trade unions recognise a free and open union to all men.

Here was a scheme giving preference to 900 men and against 300 potential members of the same union, and, however did the union or the employers think a soheme could work making these drastic differences—men are not bricks and mortar. The casual waterside worker of to-day is ■wanted where he is, and as he is. He is part of in* dustry, not outside industry. He meets a demand and cannot be abolished except by the abolition or transformation of that demand. "The remedy for evil resulting from the dissipation and disorganisation of the demand for labour can be applied here and now; it consists simply in the concentration and organisation of that demand and diminishing friction, and delay in the passage from one job to another. —I am, etc., FRINGE. 10th May.