SHEARERS’ WAGES

Manawatu Standard, Volume LII, Issue 225, 23 August 1932, Page 2

SHEARERS’ WAGES

3.30 PAL EDITION

DISCUSSION BEFORE conciliation council. Per Press Association. WKLLJNUIUX. Aug. 23. The Conciliation Council discussed in open meeting to-uay mailers in connection with stieep and wool, the parties being the shearers I moil and the Sheepowners' federation. An agreement was reached on practically ail points except the rates oi pay. The employers oiler was stated to be 15s per huu.ired. hand or machine. The union stood ter ills. Mr Nicholson, for employers, said: We will offer lbs $d for one year and see ’now tilings pail out tor the union. Mr Cook: ~ We cannot accept that "coolie rate." It ’amounts to a reduction or close on 50 per cent, compared with the wages ot four years ago. Mr Cook said the prospects oi the coming clip were bright, and lie went on to declare that in the years of glorious prosperity the shearers cud not get a share in that prosperity. Now. in the time of a temporary slump, they were expected to suffer. He said later that the shearers had arranged to shear over a million sheep in the North Island at ills per hundred, and gave it as his own opinion that the other side diet net represent the sheepiarmers of the Dominion and ho did no: believe they ready wanted an agreement this year. He said it would cos: more than 21s per hundred if they created trouble by sticking to the offer, which was an in-: suit to the shearers. Mr Nicholson denied that the : sheepowners did not want an acree-.--I■l J 1 _ _ •

tin.* shipowners were able 10 pay. It jwas absurd to call it a starvation . wage when Ids Sd a dav with keep could be earned. Mr J. Roberts, for the union, said it was recognised' that the sheepfarmers' .position was bad. but that did not Ijustify a further reduction in the i wages of the workers. An adjournment was made to the afternoon.