RAILWAY RELIEF WORKS

Hawke's Bay Tribune, Volume XIX, Issue 300, 4 December 1929, Page 9

RAILWAY RELIEF WORKS

NOT POSSIBLE TO EMPLOY MEN PERMANENTLY. MINISTER'S REPLY TO .UNION SECRETARY. Wellington, Dec. 3. Tho definite statement that it was impossible to employ permanently all men employed on railway construction work was made by the Public Works Minister to a deputation representing the New Zealand Workers’ Union. He told Mr. Cook, the union secretary, that if. the Government’s hands were forced there would be no alternative but to dismiss men. and ’the onus must be on Mr. Cook himself. The Minister denied that any instructions had gone out that any standard works should be brought down to the standard of the relief works. It was only the promise of the Government to find work for everybody that led to the placing of relief workers in railway camps. “Apparently,” said Mr. Ransom, answering one of Mr. Cook's Questions, “you are more concerned about holidays and so on than about finding men work. It seems to me that once a man is placed on relief works he sets about to make it a standard job and stick there.” If it was found possible to retain tho men they would be made standard employees, but if it was not they would have to be found work elsewhere or else discharged.