SHOPPING HOURS

Evening Post, Volume CXL, Issue 132, 1 December 1945, Page 9

SHOPPING HOURS

FIVE-DAY WEEK

AMENDING BILL PASSED

Disregard of the shopping convenience of the public was one of the main points of criticism made by Opposition members when the debate on the Shops and Offices Amendment Bill was continued in the House of Representatives yesterday afternoon. The authority of the Court of Arbitration to fix a five-day, 40-hour week, was also challenged, but the Government claimed that the Court was a safeguard of the interests of the public and Avould take into consideration the differing circumstances in each locality. The discussion lasted all day, but tlie Bill was passed just before the House rose at 6 p.m. Mr. F. Hackett (Government, Grey Lynn) considered that .there was too much back-door trading at suburban shops, though, he said, he feared that if proper steps were taken to stop it the Government would be accused of running a Gestapo. The shopping habits of the people could be changed without much difficulty if employers co-operated by paying wages early in the week instead of on Fridays. Mr. W. J. Poison (National, Stratford) said that apparently to suit about 30,000 shop assistants and their employers, the whole of the community was to be put to inconvenience. The militant unions were demanding consideration regardless of public convenience, though the Arbitration Act de/>itely stated that that factor had to De taken into account in making awards and agreements. That provision was now being abandoned. Mr. Poison said that the evidence before the Labour Bills Committee showed that the public was demanding service. Considerable business was done on Saturday mornings, and he would remind the House that in the past the Arbitration Court had stressed the necessity for Saturday trading. The Minister of Finance (Mr. Nash) said the Arbitration Court must reach decisions after having regard to the public convenience and in accordance with the requirements of the districts concerned. If the passing of the Bill meant that shops should close on Saturday morning there would be nothing for the Arbitration Court to do. Which way could the Government go to ensure the convenience of the public to the maximum, while thinking of those who served the convenience of the public? PRESSURE ON COURT. Mr. W. A. Sheat (National, Patea) said he was not prepared to hand over to the Court the power to decide what the local communities should have. When, the Act was in force pressure from all the trade unions would be exerted on the Arbitration 'Court to impose on the whole of New Zealand a uniform set of shopping conditions, irrespective of whether they met the convenience of different localities or not. The Government was not game to bring down legislation ordering the closing of shops on Saturdays because it realised that if it went the full length it would very seriously affect certain other sections of the community it was anxious not to upset, so it passed the responsibility over to the Court knowing that it would be physically impossible for the Court to give consideration to all the differing localities. The Court could only take one course in administering the Act— order Saturday to be a holiday. A universal five-day shopping week, with closed Saturdays, would be brought in by the back-door method. The Court heard only the arguments of parties in dispute, and had never taken into account evidence from the general body of the public who might be affected by its decisions. Shop assistants would receive the same remuneration for a 40-hour week as for a 44-hour week, yet in a memorandum to the Retail Shop Assistants' Award, 1942, the Cosrt said wages had been increased in further recognition of. the fact t&at those workers were called upon to work a 44-hour week .spread over ' ive and a half days. . In the Grocers' Award, 1.938, the Court held that M was impracticable to carry on the retail trade on a'4o-hour week and put the maximum hours at 44, with Friday nights and Saturday mornings. He believed that when the time arrived that an adequate service could be given in a five-day week the representatives of the people in Parliament should take the responsibility in their own hands and legislate accordingly. What was being done in the Bill was merely a means of "passing "the buck." Mr. R. McKeen (Government, Wellington South) said the Opposition could camouflage their statements as they would, but the fact of the matter was that they were opposed to the principle of the 40-hour week. Under the Bill the Court was not required to put into operation the 40rhour week; the Court could retain the 44-hour week and make provision according to the businesses and localities. The secretary of the Employers' Association, .in evidence before the Labour Bills Committee, had said that the employers would like to retain a late shopping night and have a 43-hour week, but were not opposed to a fiveday week. What did the Opposition have to say to that? CONDITIONS IMPROVED. Mr. J. Acland (National, Temuka) said conditions in shops and offices had improved 100 per cent, during the last 40 years. That being the case, he sajv no reasdn for the present legislation. A shorter week would mean th"at ; ,moi-e'people would be required" in .the shops'arid offices. There was a great shortage now of women workers, '&&&■■ if the Bill were passed it would ni-ake for discontent among those who worked in hospitals, mental institutions, and other places where V'omen were employed. The present was not the* time for all sections of'the workers to have more leisure hours. He hoped the time would come when the hours of work would be reduced, but they had first to provide for the starving people of Europe. New Zealand produce was urgently needed in Britain and the shelves of shopkeepers in the Dominion hail, to be'replenished and the people housed. "I am surprised at the reception this Bill has received from the Opposition," said the Acting Minister of Labour (Mr O'Brien), replying to the debate. The Bill had been carefully drafted in order to ensure that a full day's rest from work would be given only where workers were entitled to it and where no undue hardship would be caused. There was no better qualified tribunal than the Arbitration Court to decide the hours which should be observed by shops and offices. It was absurd to suggest that the purpose of the legislation was to close every shop on Saturday. Even if the time came when the five-day week were made universal the five working days could not coincide for all workers.