SEEKING A SETTLEMENT

New Zealand Herald, Volume LVI, Issue 17111, 17 March 1919, Page 4

SEEKING A SETTLEMENT

WAIHI MINE DISPUTE. MR. GILES AND THE UNION. PRESIDENT OFFERS TO RESIGN. [bt TELEGRAPH.—PRESS association,] WAIHI, Sunday. As the outcome of the intervention of Mr. T. Harle Giles, conciliation commissioner, in an endeavour to bring about a settlement of the trouble existing between the mine-owners and the Miners' Union, a mass meeting of miners was held in the Waihi Union Hall this afternoon. The hall was filled. Mr. Giles, in response to the request of the Miners' Union, and of the eight members who had refused to become members of the union, addressed the meeting. He said that from evidence furnished him by all parties concerned, it was clear the eight men were properly entitled to exemption from joining the union. These men had now asked for a public meeting, so that a full explanation could be made, with a view of vindicating their action in remaining non-union-ists. The meeting, he trusted, would be satisfied that these men had established their right to remain outside the union, and that being so, he felt confident that the oxempted men would in due course join tho union. Mr. H. A. Pipe, president, and one of the senior delegates, said they had blundered in not making a full explanation to the meeting -if the union, following the conference with the mineowners. He would now tender his resignation as president. The meeting is still in progress.