ABOLISH SATURDAY WORK.

Grey River Argus, 17 April 1920, Page 5

ABOLISH SATURDAY WORK.

(Received at 5.5 p.m. April 16). SYDNEY, April 16

The factory employees have given the employers a month's notice to abolish Saturday work.

SYDNEY, March 30

There is every probability, now, that a, serious fight will develop in New South Wales on the question of the elimination of Saturday work—or, rather, by the reduction 1 of working ■hours 'to 44 per week by cutting out Saturday work. The majority of employers are not: opposed to cutting out the irritating Saturday morning: run if the work, done in those four hours, is added to the work clono on the other five days.

" This No-Saturday-Work movement has bceiv gijpwing rapidly lately — the workers say that N.S.W. .stands for the slogan — aJid has now attained s er " ious proportions. It has aifected all the unions concerned in the iron and building- , trades, and the building employees generally have declared war. The employers have taken up the challenge, and the trouble is likely to commence in real earnest as from April 10th.

The .unions which,' in the city refused to work ou Saturday last, .and crowded into their halls to encourage each other to be firm, included ihe bricklayers, painters, slaters, decorators, carpenters a»d builders' labourers. The United .Labourers' the plasterers, and the stonemasons refused t 0 jc|yn the movement, and the plumbers for the moment are "on the fence."

Meanwhile the employers are getting .ready for a fight, and the employers' organisations generally are behind ,nhem. . The men who did not work on Saturday will not be paid. This coming Saturday is Easter Saturday, and would not, in' any event, be a working day. But the following Saturday, April 10th, will test the strength of the workers. The employers will probably take- drastic •action in the direction of dismissing those men who do not present themselves on - Saturdays. This might n ot work if the men were absolutely solid, but they .are not.