NEWSPAPERS HIT

Gisborne Herald, Volume LXVI, Issue 20067, 13 October 1939, Page 4

NEWSPAPERS HIT

IMPORT CUT AND WAR EMPLOYERS’ CLAIM PRINTING DISPUTE PROCEEDINGS ADJOURNED (Per Press Association.) WELLINGTON, this day. The opinion that it was safe to say that newspaper proprietors had suffered to a greater extent than most other trades and callings, first by reason of the import restrictions and, secondly and more particularly, because of the war, was expressed by the Conciliation Commissioner, Mr. M. J. Reardon, during the hearing of the dispute in the Dominion printing and related trades yesterday.

The assessor for the employers, Mr. J. M. Hardcastle, Auckland, suggested that a temporary solution should be arrived at in the dispute. The present was not a time when they could, with any confidence, make an award. Certain modifications of wage rates suggested by the employers could be brought into operation voluntarily by the employers and the conciliation council adjourned either to a date to be fixed later or for a set number of months.

“There is no great hardship to anybody in carrying on under the award as it stands,” Mr. Hardcastle said. “We can see how the situation develops. The employers simply do not know where they will be 12 months from to-day. lam certain the workers’ assessors recognise this is not a time when anybody can seriously ask for additional holidays.”

Playing Havoc With Business

After all, said Mr. Hardcastle, there was a war on and it was playing havoc with the business of every newspaper and printer in New Zealand. “It is wrecking our plans, destroying our business and upsetting our staff organisation in the loss of men, and the effect on the country as a whole is going to be calamitous,” lie said. “We do not want to take advantage of the situation, and we are not in a position to dp so even if we wanted to.” Mr. Reardon said he had been informed by a man in-one of the advertising agencies that when the customs restrictions came in a 25 per cent reduction in advertising turnover had been anticipated. That had occurred in the first month, but it had been a mere circumstance to what happened when war was declared. The attitude of the employers to the reinstatement of men to their positions when they returned from active service was outlined by Mr. Hardcastle, in reply to a question by a workers’ assessor.

Employees on Active Service

The question had been considered at a recent conference of tile Newspaper Proprietors’ Association, he said, and the attitude of the employers was that if a man enlisted he would be taken back.into his previous employment when he returned, if it could be done. However, no employer v/ho was pVudent at all could guarantee men jobs when they returned. Mr. Hardcastle said that because the employers did not know whether they would be able to do it, the men who enlisted were being told that if the employer took anyone on to the staff during the absence, every appointment was being made subject to termination on their return from active service. Every employer would do his best to take back men when they returned, but no employer could give a guarantee. The agent for the workers, Mr. K. Baxter, said the workers’ assessors appreciated all the circumstances at present. They were prepared to accept the changes which had been offered by the employers, and he suggested the council should adjourn sine die and the commissioner be empowered to call it together again at the request of either side. This course was agreed to and the council adjourned.