HOURS OF WORK

Evening Post, Volume CXXIV, Issue 60, 8 September 1937, Page 4

HOURS OF WORK

HAIRDRESSING TRADE

The Wellington industrial district hairdressers' dispute came before Mr. M. J. Reardon, Conciliation Commissioner, today. Mr. T. Tierney was advocate for the applicant workers, and Mr. A. L. Knowsley was advocate for the employers. The parties were agreed on a 44-hour week. The workers claimed that work should cease at noon on Saturday, and the counter-proposal was for the, hours to be from 8 a.m. to noon on the day of the weekty half-holiday. The minimum wages claimed by the workers! were as1 follows:—Journeymen and journeywomen hairdressers, £6 a week; hairdressers employed as managers, £7 10s a week; casual workers, 3s an hour, with a minimum of three hours' continuous employment; improvers, £4 a week for the first year and £4 10s a week for the second year.

The employers offered £5 a week for journeymen and journey women hairdressers employed within a 12----mile radius of- the Chief Post Office, Wellington, and £4 10s a week for others in; country districts. The wage proposed for hairdressers employed as managers was £6 a week, and for casual workers 2s 6d an hour. An offer of the rate fixed in the 1935 award was made in respect of improvers.

Holidays were also in j dispute, the workers claiming two .weeks' _ annual holiday on full pay, in addition to twelve days during the year, and the employers offering one week's annual holiday on full pay. in. addition to Christmas Day, Good Friday, Anzac Day, Labour Day, and the King's Birthday. It was further proposed by the employers that* if the offer as to full holidays was not acceptable one week's annual holiday on half-pay should be granted.

It was agreed that ther hours of work should be from 8 a.m. to 5.30 p.m. on four days,of the week, and from 8 a.m. to 9 p.m. on' the day on which the late night was ■ observed. The question of closing at noon on Saturday was held over until wages had been determined. The time for ceasing work on Christmas Eve, New Year's Eve, and the day before Good Friday was fixed at; 9.30 ' p.m.