“SANCTITY OF ROSTER” AT ROOT OF TRAMWAYMEN’S GRIEVANCES

Evening Star, Issue 26137, 26 June 1947, Page 8

“SANCTITY OF ROSTER” AT ROOT OF TRAMWAYMEN’S GRIEVANCES

What the president of the Dunedin branch of the Tramways Union described as “ the sanctity of the roster,” was admitted by both parties to the dispute to be the bone ol contention when representatives of the union met three delegates from the Transport Committee of the City Council in a Dispute Committee last night The Conciliation Commissioner, Mr A. B. IRigg, of Christchurch, who presided, reserved his decision. Mr W. B. Richards, who led the union’s representatives, said that the un.iou admitted the right of the transport department to change the rostered duties of employees, but denied the department the right to change the rostered days off. The previous industrial award had provided a penalty of time and a-lialf when men were required to work on 1 their rostered days off duty, but all reference to work on those days had been deleted in the present award. He quoted from the award that “the rostered days shall not be changed during the currency of the award,” and claimed that by substituting a new roster, which provided for no Sunday work for tram traffic men and a new schedule of days off duty, the award had been broken. Cr J. McCrae, chairman of the Transport Committee of the City Council, acknowledged that when the roster was working the department had no right to change the rostered days off duty. When a new roster was substituted, in a period of emergency such as the present, however, the position was different. It was absurd to claim that a roster could not be changed; an epidemic would compel that regulation to be broken if it ever existed. The Commissioner stated that in Christchurch the roster had not been changed, despite the restricted service. “ If the transport department has erred at all, it is in being too soft,” declared Cr L. M. Wright, supporting Cr McCrae. The department was the custodian of public money, he said, and the actual loss suffered by the traffic men, apart from some week-day overtime, was one Sunday’s pay every three weeks.