SHOP ASSISTANTS

Evening Star, Issue 22955, 12 May 1938, Page 3

SHOP ASSISTANTS

DISPUTE BEFORE ARBITRATION COURT THE EMPLOYERS' CASE {Teb United Press Association.] WELLINGTON, May 11. The workers’ claims in the shop assistants’ Dominion dispute were submitted to the Second Court of Arbitration on Tuesday, and several witnesses have been heard in support of the points raised. Mr T. O. Bishop opened the case for the employers late this afternoon. The first matter in dispute, Mr Bishop said, was whether the award should apply to travellers, speciality salesmen, and collectors. “There is a class of worker engaged in connection with the retail sales of certain classes of goods to whom the provisions of the general shop assistants’ award cannot be made to apply,” he said. “ The scope of the award is being greatly enlarged on this occasion. The union appears to have entirely overlooked the fact that the conditions under which these salesmen, collectors, _ and travellers work are entirely different from those which obtain inside the shops.” Mr Bishop claimed also that female assistants in receipt of a weekly wage of £ 3 10s or more, and male assistants receiving £6 a week should be exempt from the award. He directed the court’s attention to the provisions of the Shops and Offices Act, 1936, which preyented the application of the definition of “occupier” to male workers whose wages did not exceed £6 and to female workers whose wages did not exceed £4 a week. The occupier of a shop, Mr Bishop added, should not be brought under the provisions of the award, and for that reason £6 had been selected as the determining amount. Mr Bishop referred also to other matters in dispute. He submitted that the cost of selling goods had been steadily mounting for some years. To increase the wages of shop assistants beyond the general increment which had been laid down by the court since July of last year would be to place an unduly heavy burden on the trade, “It would be sufficiently severe,” he added, ‘to justify the fear that rising prices might adversely react upon sales.” The court adjourned till to-mor-row.