GUARDING WHITE PINE

Greymouth Evening Star, 28 May 1937, Page 12

GUARDING WHITE PINE

TIMBER WORKERS’ PROTEST “The effects of the Government's policy in restricting the cutting of white pine for the making of butter boxes have been disastrous on the timber industry of the West Coast, resulting in loss of employment to timber workers, the closing down of some sawmills, and the probable closing down of others,” said Mr. F. L. Turley, secretary of the Westland, Nelson, and Marlborough Timber Workers’ Union on Tuesday (to the Wellington “Evening Post”), in a statement he was authorised to make by the general meeting of the union last week. As no successful attempt was being made at reafforestation with white pine, he maintained, it was doomed, and a substitute would have to be found in any case, if it had not already been found in red pine. “The unions have become quite alarmed at the turn which events have taken,” said Mr. Turley; “arid look to the Government to clear the position. Unless this is done very quickly, the state of affairs will be worse than it was when the Forestry Department was run under the policy of the late Sir Francis Bell some years ago. This will be so on the West Coast particularly. The difficulty is chiefly in connection with the prices for white pine, the classification of white pine, and the prevention of the export of white pine to Australia. Like the Attorney-General, we agree that it is only a matter of time when rimu is definitely going to be used for butter boxes,’and in those conditions we cannot see any advantage in not allowing the white pine forests to be cut while they are a marketable asset; in a few years they may be of no more value than rimu.

PRICES AND CLASSIFICATION “The Government is asking the millers to put white pine on the trucks at a price which makes it quite impossible for them to maintain decent wages, working, and hours conditions. To give some idea of the cost of production of this timber, it may be mentioned that it has to be carted from 50 to 70 miles to the rail head at Ross, and the' cost of this carting, and railage to Greymouth, with the 40-hour week, cannot possibly be less than 8/- per 100 ft. The cost of cutting the timber, with the 40-hour week, cannot be less than 7/- per 100 ft. Royalties on all white pine run to 2/6 per 100 ft, making the actual charges to put this timber on the trucks 17/6 per 100 ft. before the millers can hope for any return from their outlay. The present classification means that a large amount of white pine timber is going to be wasted, unless the Government would undertake to buy the -whole of the output, store it, and use it as it is wanted. The position is that when mills are cutting njixed red and white pine, it does not pay them to touch the white pine, and the result is that this timber has to be left in the bush, not only a waste, but a danger from fire. At last week-end, three millers had definitely closed down. They had been cutting practically all white pine. Other millers have stated their intention of closing down definitely unless they can get some reasonable arrangement with the Government. “We also say that so long as white pine is supplied to the people of New Zealand in the quantities they require, there should be no embargo on the export of -white pine to Australia. The embargo will simply mean that they will refuse to take our rimu, the trade in which has taken years to build up. If they have to get the material for their butter boxes from other countries, they will get their other timbers from those countries also.

“On the West Coast, Nelson, and Marlborough alone there are 1,600 wage workers, without office staffs, managers, etc., employed in the timber industry, which supplies 50 per cent, of the work on the waterfront in Greymouth and Hokitika, and provides practically half the railway freights on the West Coast. Taken from every angle, the closing down of the industry, which is what the present policy means, will be a definite loss. As a union we want the people who use white pine in New Zealand protected, but not at the expense of the workers or the sawmillers.

“The great trouble to-day is that the Forestry Department is carrying on exactly the same methods as were carried on by Sir Francis Bell. Those responsible for the Forestry Department are apparently not conversant with the facts pertaining to the timber industry. We suggest that in this matter the Government take the workers’ representatives into their confidence, and allow both workers and employers to state the position, so that it cannot be said that the employers are not. putting up a fair case. We think the time is coming when some drastic alteration should be made in Forestry Department methods. Of the 1,600 men employed in the timber industry in our district, between 400 and 500 are engaged in cutting white pine, and about SOO in cutting red pine."