SETTLED AT LAST

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume LXXII, 23 January 1939, Page 11

SETTLED AT LAST

PIG IRON DISPUTE I.U.PA.— By Electric Telegraph—Copyrisrbtl SYDNEY, 22nd January. The pig iron dispute at Port Kembla was settled on Saturday, thus ending a two-months’ hold-up at that port. The men will report for work on Monday. A spokesman issued a report reiterating their dislike of loading metals and materials for an aggressor nation and expressing the hope that the Australian public would bring pressure to bear on the Government with the view to a complete embargo on pig iron for export. SYDNEY, 21st January. Port Kembla waterside strikers were dismayed yesterday upon learning that thirty-one railway trucks of pig iron aggregating 1600 tons had left their port overnight and arrived in Sydney for shipment aboard the Broken Hill Company’s freighter Iron King, which is lying at the Pyrmont wharf, and was consigned to Melbourne, where wharf labourers, working under license, are expected to handle it.

The Port Kembla dispute began with the refusal of watersiders to load pig iron for Japan on the steamer Dalfram on 15th November, a refusal which was repeated after the Federal Government had threatened to apply the licensing provisions of the Transport Workers’ Act at the end of November last. This would mean that all workers would be licensed and their licenses cancelled if they committed misdemeanours. Delegates from seventeen unions supported the watersiders’ stand, and the crew of the Dalfram declared they would refuse to take the ship to sea if the iron was loaded. Railwaymen then refused to handle trucks in which the iron was carried, a second steamer, the Nellore. was involved and had to sail without pig iron. A public meeting at Port Kembla supported the men and called on the Federal Government to prohibit the export of war materials to Japan.