Unions for Domestic Servants

Manawatu Times, Volume 61, Issue 1423, 19 June 1936, Page 6

Unions for Domestic Servants

WILL NOT BE DISCOURAGED BY GOVERNMENT. Per Press Association. WELLINGTON, Last Night. “Since the clause dealing with workers not employed for the pecuniary gain of the employers had been deleted from the Industrial Conciliation and Arbitration Amendment Bill provision would have to be made in some other Act to safeguard the conditions and wages of domestic servants and others eliminated," said the Minister of Labour (liou. H. T. Armstrong), in an interview to-day. “I am not in a position to say what form this legislation will take," said the Minister, “but I have been discussiug it for some time witn my colleagues and with the officers of the Department of Labour. Incidentally there never has been anything in the law of the country to prevent domestic servants from forming unions, but probably if they had formed unions and applied for awards the fact that they were not employed for pecuniary gain would have ruled them out. Lor certain reasons, however, it has not been considered advisable in the meantime to bring domestic servants and others into the scope of legislation, but I can say that it would no doubt be to the decided advantage of domestic servants to form a union and .it would even be more helpful to the Government than otherwise for them to do so. We do not intend to discourage them in doing that."