APPRENTICES' ACT

Evening Post, Volume CXII, Issue 123, 20 November 1926, Page 8

APPRENTICES' ACT

NOT A FAILURE SHOULD BE GIVEN FAIR TRIAL. The view expressed by Mr. P. "W. Bowley, Registrar of Apprentices and Secretary for Labour, in an. address, at, Wellington on Tuesday that the Ap'-"' prentices Act had proved a failure^ is not shared by Mr. E. C. Sutcliffe, secretary of the Canterbury branch of the Amalgamated Society of Carpenters and Joiners, and a member of the Christchurch Carpenters' Apprentices Committee, states the "Lytteltoa Times." Mr. Sutcliffe said that he thought it. was very ill-advised of Mr. Rowley to have criticised the Act in such a man*' ,ncr before it had been given a fair trial, and had at least run the full, period of the average apprenticeship,of..." live years. With reference to the Ap- Al . prentices' Committee with which ■ h«^ was personally associated he was able ■ to say that there was a desire that tflt; Act should be allowed a fair oppojir.. tunity of being ''tried out before being;,, condemned as a failure. That also was the attitude of several other Appren-c tices' Committees in Chriatchurch..,.«.r-,r

"The trade unions have all refrain., ed from criticising the Act adversely,, because they recognise that it is^im- . possible to plant a tree and expect » full.crop of fruit in a couple of years', ■, time," said Mr. Sutcliffe. "The .Ap-,, prentices Act is experimental legisla-. tion, and like all other experimental; legislation has its defects. These defects can only be remedied by expert . en.cc, and to bring out the full bene?, fits of the Apprentices Act the Legis;,. Jature requires to amend the Act quit.9^' frequently. Other experimental legis-; lation such as the Factories Act and. the Arbitration Act were amended every year while they were in t,heir infancy. The Apprentices Act was welcomed by the average trade unionist in New Zealand as being an honest attempt to remedy a system which had fallen into very bad ways." ■■,;:,' The chief complaint made by Mr. Eowley was that there was not a sufficient numbr^ of boys employed under the provisions of the Act, but Mr. Eowley .seemed to forget that it was better "to have a hundred boys employed^ at a trade and learning it thoroughly' than to have twice that number thro.wi' into a trade under no restrictions what-.* ever, given a partial training, then thrown out partially trained, and have to re-learn their trade under a systemof underrate permits. Eecently an.-,ei!-" fort was made to enlarge the proportion : of apprentices in a certain section-, of; the building trade, and it was shownthe present proportion of one to three-■ or fraction of three was not filled; byabout 140. . „..;'; "The .success or otherwise of :the. Apprentices Act, in my opinion," said' Mr. Sutcliffe, "lies in this feature, thatthe employers and workers' sections' of the committees will have to work* together to endeavour, not perhaps-^to-produce more tradesmen, but to pio T . duce more efficient tradesmen. If this: becomes the ultimate effect of the -Ap- ■ prentices Acl it will have done good work." ■ •