ATTITUDE FIXED

Evening Post, Volume CXXX, Issue 113, 8 November 1940, Page 4

ATTITUDE FIXED

A PLAIN STATEMENT

MR. SEMPLE & RAILWAY JOB

i (By Telegraph—Press Association.) CHRISTCHURCH, This-Day. Replying tv a telegram from a mass meeting of the men allegedly locked out on the South Island Main Trunk railway construction job requesting his presence at the scene of the trouble, the Minister of Public Works (Mr. Semple) says he has no intention of complying, as he has nothing to discuss with them. His advice to the men is to comply with the terms of their agreement, return to work forthwith, and settle union difficulties in a constitutional manner.' "There is no use communicating with me any further," Mr. Semple says. "I am determined to stick to the agreement, the terms of which are entirely in favour of the men, as the preference clause was inserted at their own request to protect them against nonunion labour. It is amazing that this clause should now be used to destroy the principle for which it was created. My Government is carrying on this job under considerable difficulty during the war period. At the moment we are fighting for o"ur existence with the enemy at our very gates, and the public and the Government are in no mood to tolerate the holding up of a large public works, job on issues that bear no relationship to the urgency for the speeding up of its completion."