Is A Foreman Necessary?

Northern Advocate, 27 July 1938, Page 7

Is A Foreman Necessary?

[Per Press Association. Copyright .] CHRISTCHURCH, This Day. Whether or not it is necessary to employ a foreman in a bakehouse was the issue placed before the Second Court of Arbitration yesterday morning, when an appeal against the decision of the magistrate who dismissed a case brought by the Labour Department against L. A. Woodward, Ltd., for an alleged breach of the Northern, Wellington and Canterbury Bakers’ and Pastrycooks’ and Labourers' Award, was heard. Mr R. T. Bailey, for the Labour Department, submitted that an employer was entitled to t)e regarded as a foreman only if he was a competent baker, and if he did the work of a foreman.

Mr Justice Hunter remarked that' the magistrate had held in his judgment thai there was nothing in the award regarding a foreman having to be employed. Dr. A. C. Haslam, for Woodward, Ltd., said that the defence had been that Mr Woodward did substantially the work of a foreman, and there was no provision in the award requiring a foreman to be employed. Mr Bailey, from the way the charges were framed, apparently considered that the employment of a foreman was obligatory, but Mr Woodward did all the supervising required in an automatic bakery. The court reserved its decision.