UNION OF HOTEL WORKERS MAY HOLD FURTHER MEETING

Greymouth Evening Star, 11 October 1947, Page 7

UNION OF HOTEL WORKERS MAY HOLD FURTHER MEETING

“Feeling in the union, outside of workers in the hotel industry itself, appears to be very strong against the anti-boycott vote at Thursday’s meeting,” stated the president of the Westland Hotel and Restaurant Workers’ Union, Mr R. G. Ferguson, this morning. Another meeting of the union to reconsider the position is like!j 7 to be held shortly, he added.

Since the West Coast Tracies Council first decided to boycott hotels charging 7cl for beer, the Hotel Workers’ Union, which also represents many other related trades, has endeavoured to steer a neutral course in order to avoid embarrassing the members who are employed in hotels, declared Mr Ferguson. This attitude had been satisfactory from the Trades Council’s point of view. At the meeting on Thursday, however, the attendance of 44 had been composed largely of hotel workers who had carried, by 40 votes to two. a resolution opposing the boycott and calling on the Trades Council to lift its embargo on the hotels. As a result of this decision, sections of the union, apart from those employed in the hotel industry, are moving for another meeting to be called, and, according to Mr Ferguson, this meeting is likely ttf be held shortly. The membership of the union' is over 400, including workers all over the West Coast, and apart from those in Greymouth none .has yet had an opportunity of expressing an opinion on the issue. Referring to a report in the Evening Star yesterday, that hotel workers at Thursday’s meeting had been “practically hostile” to the action of the Trades Council on the beer boycott, Mr Ferguson explained today that the workers’ attitude was that they would be hostile to the council “or'anyone else who would interfere with them.”