LABOUR SHORTAGE

Evening Post, Volume CXXXVIII, Issue 137, 7 December 1944, Page 9

LABOUR SHORTAGE

FREEZING INDUSTRY

AUCKLAND FACING LOSSES

P-A. ' AUCKLAND, This Day. A statement thai farmers would lose thousands of pounds as a result of shortage of labour for the freezing industry around Auckland was made by a representative of the industry. Labour requirements at the works are still a long way from being met and the approach of the peak supply of lambs is being regarded with concern, he said. Hundreds of positions are still to be filled and the situation was desperate. The industry around Auckland had never previously been so seriously short of labour. The position was far worse than in December, 1941, when all available men were required to man defence posts during the Japanese threat to the Southern Pacific. Serious national loss would be caused through inability of the feezing works to handle all of the lambs that would be ready for killing in the next two weeks. Farmers have lambs available and if they could not be dealt with in' the works and had to be left the> would go back in condition. That would mean a loss of thousands of pounds to the farmers, and the country as a whole. It would be a loss that could not be recouped, and the longer the desperate shortage of labour continued the greater* would be the loss.

It also seemed that there would be deficiencies in our supply of vital foodstuffs to Britain and to the fighting forces.

The speaker said the position he had described was not just a possibility. It was definite that farmers would lose money through the acute labour deficiencies in freezing works. An indication of the position in which the industry had been placed was given by approximate shortages of men. At Westfield there was a shortage of about 250 men and at Southdown at least another 100 were required. The Horotiu works also required about 100 more men to deal with stock that would shortly come forward.