COAL MINERS’ EARNINGS

Evening Star, Issue 17921, 17 March 1922, Page 3

COAL MINERS’ EARNINGS

An important case to mining interests was decided by Mr G., Uruickshank, SAL. at Invercargill yesterday. A miner sued tho Nightcaps Coal Company to recover the difference between £8 11s (being tha wages due for eight and a-half days’ work at a minimum wage of 18a) and £5 3s 6d (being the amount earned at the tonnage rate paid by the company). The case wav a test one under the new award, by which a considerable reduction is made in tho earnings of minors. The Magistrate said the difference in tho output and the earnings of the men under tho old agreement and the new award was very striking. Plaintiff before Christmas averaged three and a-half tons of coal hewn, and made a daily wage of £1 16s. Now his average output was two and ahalf tons, and his average wage was 13s. The men generally were each sending out one ton less per day, and earning less than half their former wages. No one could say 13s was a fair wage for a conscientious minor. The award fixed tho wage at 18s a day when the men were on piecework. Clause 25 of the award compelled the company to make tho men’s earnings up to 18s a day when working on tonnage rales if a man, through no fault of his own, was unable to earn 18s per shift. Tho company had refused to make the extra payment, alleging that the men, being dissatisfied with tha award, were going slow. The onus was on the company to prove that. Plaintiff seemed to His Worship to be a fine type of miner, with a long experience in Wales and America. It the company considered a miner was not earning an average of 18s at tonnage rates through malingering or limiting the output, it should dismiss him. Tho award tonnage rates were so low that to his mind a minor could not earn tho minimum wage, ’the company had failed to convince him that the man’s failure to earn 18s a day was through any fault ci his own, and judgment must be given for tho amount claimed, with costs.