WORKERS’ WELFARE

Gisborne Herald, Volume LXXIII, Issue 21978, 23 March 1946, Page 4

WORKERS’ WELFARE

N.Z. CONDITIONS CO-OPERATIVE PLAN MR. T. HILL’S OPINIONS (P.A.) WELLINGTON. March 23. ‘'How many workers will say Tm happy in my work and I love my boss?’ ” asked Mr. T. Hill, secretary of the New Zealand Waterside Workers’ Union, commenting yesterday on the employers’ reaction to the Government’s call for greater production. “I have been criticised in public throughout New Zealand for my statement that the employers' support for the Walsh proposals would appear like ‘the kiss of death’ to the workers,” said Mr. Hill, ‘‘but it is a clear and simple fact that the employers have taken no real interest in the workers’ welfare. They have simply used the workers’ labour for their own profit-making purposes. Government's Efforts “That attitude among employers remains, and while it does the workers cannot be blamed for regarding the boss with suspicion. The New Zealand Labour Government has done more to raise the living standards of the people than any other Government I know, but where is there any evidence of a similar interest on the part of employers in the improvement of the workers’ conditions? How can workers be happy in their work when relations in industry remain as they are? “Class strife was created the very first day poverty existed alongside plenty. It is re-emphasised, consciously or unconsciously, every time the workers attempt to improve their living standards. That has been so right from the time suffering and penalties were inflicted on the first leaders of the trade union movement, and the arguments used to-day against a reduction of hours are the same arguments that were used 30 years ago. “The relationship of employer and employee has, in fact, changed little. It is true that raising wages just to chase prices does not increase real wages, and until this situation is removed, to talk of increased production is just folly.

The Production Problem

“How to increase production is what we are all concerned about. The Chamber of Commerce has not given the answer. Neither have the editors of the newspapers, and I do not propose to give an answer either. But I do claim that when a worker is given some say in the management of industry and a more equitable share of its privileges and profits, then he will have a far greater incentive to work—in short: we should cancel the workers’ present status, under which he is just an employee listed on the pay-roll, and set him up instead as an active thinking partner in his industry, ffihen we achieve this we shall have gone some of the way towards industrial peace. “As for a strikeless society, Hitler tried to achieve that. Surely we are not going to try to emulate Hitler! Cannot we agree that, as long as an employer is buying labour, an employee has the right to refuse to sell? “Waterside workers have been subjected to caustic, comments, but has not the history of this industry all over the world been one where improvements in conditions have only been extracted after long and bitter struggles? “While we proceed on a basis of profit and interest, instead of on real values—work and goods—we shall continue to witness such struggles. Only on the basis I have indicated will the trade union movement respond to the call for greater production.”