THE DILUTION OF LABOR IN NEW ZEALAND'

Evening Star, Issue 16263, 4 November 1916, Page 8

THE DILUTION OF LABOR IN NEW ZEALAND'

SOME RUSTIC RUMINATIONS. [By Claude Hut-pei"..] I The dilution of labor in Great Britain has provided for tho old mother a pro- , blem whose final end and determination I |t is difficult to foresee. Wo hero in these islands of blessed ponce and plenty stand afar off and view tho problem with that philosophic aloofness and detachment which the intervening 13,000 miles afford. But I wonder if it lias dawned upon us as a people that the very samo problem is maturing for us hero and will presently have to be mot and salved ? 1" wonder; and here I venture to set forth the simple cogitations of a country worker on the matter. Too often and 'too much is the I country worker an inarticulate mortal, I not because he does not think, but because ho is not given to speech and lacks the fatal facility of more fluent town lirothers, who, he thinks, often drown sense in sound. Just because he so rarely lifts his voice- aloud, this bona fide sum-ma-ry of his thoughts upon a pregnant problem may be endured by a public"upon whom he does not, too often obtrude. THE PROBLEM IN THE CITY. Ho will not speak in any dogmatic tones of the position in tho city—that must be .left to the city man. Yet, quite iairly, he may offer a few very obvious reflections. In New Zealand cities, so far as he can learn, labor has been diluted chiefly in office and shopkeeping businesses. The young male clerks and shop assistants have enlisted, and in many cases their places havo been taken by lady substitutes. So far as one caJi learn, the new arrangements give perfect satisfaction. The ladies are found to be bright, intelligent, capable, and, as tho Scots say, "quick at tho uptak." Their employers speak loud in their p-raise, and the cyme will say that the reasons for such praise aro self-evident. For one th:wr the ladies are probably a more pliable set, and are more amenable to orders arid discipline than the voung independent fellows they have "replaced. For another they are probably cheaper—which in itself would cover a multitude of sins. And the ladies themselves are no less pleased than the emplovers. They like tho increased importance which is theirs, now they are doing men's work, and again, though they aro probably being paid far less than the men were paid, they aro getting better wages than they ever had before. This being so. it must be admitted that it will bo rather a difficult and delicate, matter to displace or upset an arrangement that seems to bo so mutually satisfactory to both parties. But if _it is not npsct, what then? The boys will bo returning before very long, and if tho present dilution of labor continues they will return to find that their stoois are occupied in the offices, their places in the .shops by ladies who refuse to budge, and who are backed up by the employers. Wo are all patriots ' to-day. We will promise the boys everything 'if they but go out to fight for. us. But what shall wo be tho morrow after peace is proclaimed, and what shall wo do for those boys who return to find their jobs havo been taken up? It is timo some of us were thinking about the problem. The Government seem to bo sunk in such a beatific dream of their own super-exeel-lenro that they cannot see or think of such matters, but tho problem' is assuredly eomingviiKl it is a ha'rd one to solve. At seem to be blundering along in a sort of fatalism, hoping, Mfeawberl(ke, that, something will turn up. But tho age of .miracles- is past, and unless we make preparations to meet tho certain difficulty, we shall face it, bankrupt and insolvent in resources, a.s the immortal Wilkins always was in his pecuniary affairs. TTTR PROBLEM IN THE COUNTRY. When I leave the city and cross to tho country I.find myself on more familiar ground. Hero can be offered the direct testimony of my own knowledge and experience, and here, too, perhaps the problem will be most acute, and offer the most serious difficulties when the hour of decision arrives. ' Let us take any typical agricultural-pastoral district of Otago and endeavor to appraise the difficulties which are certainly accruing. Here on farm and station in pre-war days life and work moved on in a fairly reasonable fashion. On the largo places you would find tie typical New Zealand workers and shepherds, men, of course, predominating, with a fair number of youths and striplings. It seemed to be a fairly tolerable realisation of the just demand of organised labor that apprentice labor be employed only in a reasonable 'degree, graduated according to the amount of adult labor employed. Wheiv, there were 20 employees, say, you would find five or six boys. A complete, a revolutionary, change has taken place during tho past two years Nov,- boy cr youth labor predominates, loitil the.ro is somo point in the bitter gibe of an old farm .hand that wo are now having "baby-farming" in New Zealand. Very much tho sa.K.e talo can be told in regard to the. pastoral work. Now, the shepherds are. in vast munix-rs of eases ':>k?iv- striplings fresh from school, who swagger in th.\ glory of Ixiing promoted to di> men's work. The elder tdiepberds. the real shepherds, do not like it, of course. As always happens where there is an undue p-ropurliou uf boy labor, the burden falls heavilv on the- men, wn i have to a.-sumc greater re*q>onsihiiily, ami hu prepared to do more than their rightful share to keep things moving. You caun<it expect a boy to do a man's work. !!'■ luiis not got, the physique to do it if he want-'d to do it ; bin 1 havo never yet met (lie boy who had the slightest desire to ttv to do it. 1 do not write in disparagcn cut of the boys. Roys will be boys to the etui of the chapter; but what is the game, at all of the employers who thus set them t:i~ks they cannot and will not accomplish'.' THE. EMPLOYERS" VIEW. Not bring an employer, J can only make an intelligent »iiiv,s at their motives in tints favoring boy Jabot" so notoriously. It is not that men —.trown and capable men —'ire. ro scarce. fx-a.ic.er than in normal years undoubtedly they arc, but when you see an employer "turn down" some man applicant lVr wotk and engage instead some city stripling, you may l>o certain that some other motive is at work. In many eiccs it is probably dv.o to the desire, of the emphiyor.-i to "get one on to tiia workers." Jf by hook or crook the employer can get tho numbers of workers multiplied, Jm is cutting deeply into the. power of the workers. It may bo said that boy kibe- will not pay, and that tho employer would not have it unless ho was compelled by tho foreo of circumstances. That is Ik,tii true and untrue. Boy labor I does not pay, but tho employer hopes that the- deficiencies of tho boys will bo made good by the few men. -Again, even if the work is inferior, boy labor helps to keep wager; at a low level. TJio boys themselves are extraordinarily well paid—they i aro paid, in fact, as highly as the men, who shouid by every rule of justice and fairplay hi paid twice as much. This is not an over-statoment of the cate, ajid I could cite stores of cases from my own personal experience. A boy working, say, three hours a day and loafing or skylarking for the rest of the day get 3 PA a week. An able-bodied man who is called to any heavy work that may bo going—work these boys simply could not stand up to—gets 25s a week. A stripling commg from town without knowledge, or experience gets tho wage which a qualified shepherd, with the experience of years behind him, gets. It Ls scandalously unjust, and the men aro bitter. They do •not ask that the boy's wages should be reduced, but they do ask that tho wages should be graduated according to the abilities and capabilities, of tho workers. Certain it is that thi? dilution of lalior on these lines :s leading straight for trouble for the employers, and certainly, too, the trouble will havo been well earned. They may think they are "besting" the worker just now, but he laughs best who laughs laet, and 1 would bet that the worker will laugh last and longest. • WHEN THE' BOYS COME BACK. . And just imagine tho mix-up we shall havo when the boys como back if this stale of matters be allowed to persist. When, the teamster or glc-ughniaai. or, eheju*

[ herd seeks his old job ho will find that ha has been supplanted' by a.'bov ocr stripling then I think the fun will begin. No one would grumble in tho slightest if tho man-power of tho country.was being employed to the fullest degree and if boys were brought in to make up tho shortr-co. But that is not tho case at, all. Manpower is cold-shouldered, boy labor is favored, and our returning soldiers will have an amazing state of affairs to clear up when they arrive. One does not cave to suggest remedies, though certainly such cases as I know call for drastic treatment. If only rural labor were organised! Wo have all long ago ccme to the assured conclusion that the only way of dealing with such employers effectively is with the mailed list. It is no good appealing to their conscience : many of them havo no use for a conscience.". Does the payment of men on tho samo scale as boys bespeak a conscience or any sense of fairness? They will not treat tho workers fairly unless the workers can compel thorn to do so by force majeure. Wherefore I would the workers were organised, and forced a fair measure upon unfair ein-. plovers, whereby boy labor would be reasonably proportioned to tho adult labor. The returned soldiers are not likely to acquiesce meekly in the present state, of matters. They will not consider they havo got a " square deal" if, while they wero absent, fighting for us, this new 'syeteiu of baby-farming was introduced. 'They will work for its overturn, and every truedemocrat will help them. WORKING "FOR FUN." The only possible explanation of this state of matters is that employers think they are thus, paying back old snores Hero is another iilnminatjng instance o( what is being done. The farmers and pastoralists are now yearly appealing to technical colleges and high schools to semi forth their students tit assist at shearing and harvest work. Now, let uk look thii business squarely in the face. First of all, let it be admitted that the boys employed In a shearing shed must not bo paid less than tho award rates, but they are usually sons of well-to-do parents and come out to work " for fun" more than to earn wages. And what is one,inevitable result? It is that these hays, playing at work, displace the local boys, sons of working men, to whom tho wages of tho shearing season would be a great help. Why are those other boys imported, then'? One fails to find 'one single credible reason beyond the presumption that employers take a. devilish delight in disappointing tho local bovs and scoring off against their fathers, this is how tha workers look upon it. If tho emplovers. can put a better face upon matter's,'the workers would be interested to examine it as fairly as might be. Certain it is that it is most unfair'and unjust to emplov these amateur working bovs to the exclusion of real working hoys, who work for wagos and not for " fun." THE SHEARING TROUBLE. Take, again, tho trouble over tho shearing rates Tht employers, getting nearly double the price for their wool as compared with the price when tho rales for shearing were fixed hv award, are refusing, or making a great pretence of refusing, to concede 25s per 100 instead of the award rates of 20s. They offer, indeed, a bonus of 2s 6d. but some of them swear to die in the last ditch before conceding tho other half crown. Let us examine briefly what it amounts to. Let us put it moderately, and say that the wool grower gets 9d or lOd per lb us an extra and excess war profit above pre-war prices. Tho shearer asks less than one-eighth of a penny .per lb as his share of that. Ho is quite content, to leave- the pastoralist tha remaining B*d or 9Jd per lb of excess profits—profits which the sheep farmer never earned, or worked for, or could claim with any honesty in any court of equity on earth. But see the' storm the pastoralist makes at the mere suggestion! It is robbery, he declares ; the shearer must abide by the legal award, the award gives him a handsome wage, and so forth and so on, ad infinitum. But if you apply this reasoning of tho farmer to another set of circumstances in which he is keenly interested, you will find he changes his tune in a' remarkable iashion. Indeed, he adopts the shearer's argument in toto to support his new thesis. Take, for example, a case that is arousing ilio virtuous indignation of farmers and pastoralisls at the present moment—tho disposal in England of the surplus frozen meat sent from hero to tho Imperial authorities. First of all, let us remember that their caso is not on all fours with that of the shearers. The shearers aro bound by a pre-war rate. Tho farmers are getting from tho Imperial authorities a far higher price for their meat than ever before. But they got righteously indignant because they susiwct that the' speculator Ju the Homeland aro making a bit extra off the surplus of that meat and so thotvj is a steady stream of protest and objurgation and threatening pouring steadily 'to London via Wellington. Do these farmers ever think, I wonder, that, as regards wool and shearing, they themselves aro the speculators, and are, refusing to the shearers here any participation in the extra profits which they demand for themselves iu the matter of" tho frozen meat If it is right for them to say that they must have their share of that'oxtra profit made in London, bow in tho namn of common fcenso can they refuse tho claim of the shearers to a mere tithe of their owi; extra profits on wool in New Zealand? .\ 1 ittJo perspicacity would have saved them from such an egregious inconsistency—but sel[-interest, too zealously pursued, "always results in a moral or mental squint. WHAT IS THE SOLUTION? Well, beforo long, please God, our clerks and shop assistants and farm workers and 6hopherds and shearers will bo coming back in their thousands, and Kecking again their old positions in tho army of "labor. And what will happen then? For the raid;', will be tilled up with boys and youths, ami iu some cases by girls and young women, lias any person any reasonable, any feasible or possible sehemo to band to deal with the matter ]t is already time some sehemo was being formulated, for, as in !•■> many other important war measures, from Conscription to tho War Loan, New Zealand must look for guidance ami a policv from tho Prns's and tho people. We ha.v'o a Parliament without a policy, a Cabinet without convictions. They are past praying for, and the eooiict tho sagacious leaders of tho people begin to hew out a policy—which Parliament may uccept ready made—tho better will it bo for u,> all against that day when tho boys come homo to take their old places in tho commercial and industrial world. Our soldier* will not suffer tamely such a state of matters as I have shadowed forth here, and il tho "muddle through" (laissez fairc) policy ho trusted to see us through—well, 1 see troubles ahead, and chielly for the employer, who to-day bestrides Ids little world like a comic-opera Colossus.