EMPLOYERS FORESTALL COURT WITH WAGES INCREASE

Grey River Argus, 24 August 1949, Page 4

EMPLOYERS FORESTALL COURT WITH WAGES INCREASE

Stabilisation Ignored P.A. INVERCARGILL, August 23. "I think that the Court is entitled to ask why vou agreed to an increase of 3Ad an hour, at a' time when the Court, because of stabilisation, might not have approved of such an increase, and when you had no means of knowing what the Court’s next wage pronouncement would be”, said Mr Justice Tyndall, at a sitting of the Arbitration Court in Invercargill to-day, after Mr A. Alsweiler, who was appearing for th e employers in connection with an application for a new award for the Southland electrical workers, had said that the employers had agreed to a wage increase from 3s 7d to 3s 10id an hour.

Mr Alsweiler: “Perhaps it was because the employees’ assessors put up such a good case. Workers in the same industry were receiving 3s 10id in the north”.

On behalf of the Union, Mr J. Neale, of Wellington, the national secretary of the. New Zealand Engineers’ Union, said that the new award covered only registered electrical wiremen. The old award covered electricians as well. The parties had agreed to 3s lOld an hour, but, since then, the Court had agreed to 4s an hour for registered wiremen. in other centres. Therefore the Union was asking for th e same wage for these workers in Southland. His Honour said that an increase might be justified by the fact that the new award was restricted to registered wiremen. If the award had covered othei’ workers, then there was the chance that the Court could not have agreed to an increase. In reply to His Honour, Mr Neale said that workers who were not registered would not be covered by the award, and, on the suggestion of His Honour, he agreed to the insertion in the award of a clause making this clear.

Mr Alsweiler said he was empowered to agree to only 3s lid an hour. The Court reserved its decision.