Women And Tramway Work

Northern Advocate, 21 August 1943, Page 4

Women And Tramway Work

tP.A.) WELLINGTON. This Day. "Tramway tracks, owing to there being insufficient labour available to look after them, are rapidly getting into a condition to cause grave anxiety," said the Mayor (Mr. Hislop), commenting on the decision of the Minister for Manpower (Mr. McLagan) to serve notice on the Wellington City Council prohibiting employment of girls and women for manual labour in connection with maintenance and repair of tramway tracks. "Many efforts have been made through the Manpower Office to obtain labour for the work, but these efforts have proved unavailing. A little time ago a group of women offered to do the work. They were shown the nature of it in the depot and recently started work. The women are ail volunteers and, in most cases, have been engaged on other types of work such as on the land and so on. "I personally spoke to them on the job this morning and they told me they were most anxious to continue and that the work was much lighter than many of them had done before. They are not called upon to do any really heavy work and all they clo is within their physical capacity. Every one of them is keen to continue. Minister’s Action “Astounding” "I was astounded last night,” continued Mr. Hislop, “to receive word that the Minister proposed to serve an order upon the city council prohibiting women from doing this work. This order was served upon us this morning and was considered by the Tramways Committee. The committee resolved to inform the Minister that, owing to the urgent necessity in the public interest of getting on with this work without delay, it was proposed to continue employment of the women. The Minister is also being advised in the same letter that lie should he aware of the failure of manpower authorities to supply men for this work and of a request made to the Prime Minister some time ago for an urgent meeting with the council on this general question. "It is astounding to me that the liberty of the subject, should be so curtailed that a group of women anxious and willing and capable of assisting in carrying out urgent public work should he ordered by the Minister to cease such work, more especially when he has been unable to make any provision for the work being done. Volunteers should be free to work on a job of this importance. To stop them is, in my opinion, a negation of the principles of freedom. I again express my appreciation to the women of the splendid effort they are making." Minister’s Explanation The Minister for Industrial Manpower (Mr. McLagan) staled today that the Claim of the Mayor of Wellington that the manpower officer had been asked to supply male labour for tram track maintenance and had been unable to do so was definitely contrary to fact. No application had been made, and if an application had been made, labour would have been provided at least to the extent of ihe number of women engaged. All previous requests from the city council for labour had been given every consideration and had been given a high degree of priority. The engagement of women on work for which they were not suited when men were available, and women were so urgently required for all types of essential work, was definitely not in the national interests, and could not be justified. Agreement Reached Mr. McLagan said that representatives of the city council had met the Prime Minister (Mr. Fraser) and himself last night for full discussion of all the council's labour difficulties, and council representatives agreed that women would be withdrawn from track maintenance and directed to olher urgent work for which .hey were more suited. As a result, the Minister’s order had been revoked as no longer necessary, Defiance of the order could not have been tolerated. His department would see that the council received the labour necessary for urgent maintenance work.