SHIP DISPUTE SETTLED.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LX, Issue 18411, 29 May 1923, Page 8

SHIP DISPUTE SETTLED.

STOKEHOLD COMPLEMENT.

MEN'S CONTENTION UPHELD.

[BY TELKG3APH. —PRESS ASSOCIATION.]

WELLINGTON, Monday.

The first dispute under the new award for seamen was heard' before the Disputes Committee last week, and the committee's decision, which was in favour of the union, was communicated to the parties to-day. The committee comprised Mr. N. D. Hood, chief inspector of machinery and chief inspector of ships. (chairman), Captain P. A. Petersen, Messrs. W. H. Bennett and W. A. Kennedy (shipowners), and Messrs. J. H. Adams, W. T. Young, and J. Dent (Seamen's Union). The subject of the dispute was the manning of the stokehold of the Union Steam Ship Company's Waitomo. The employers' case was that the vessel was built in 1911 and purchased. by the Union Company two years later. Prior to coming into their possession,'and for a year afterwards, her complement of firemen was six. The company alleged that in 1914 it was forced by the union to ship three extra firemen for the run from Wellington to Newcastle, i although . there was a definite agreement that these extra hands were to be retaind only while the vessel was engaged in trades other than intercolonial and coastal. Since 1915 nine firemen were carried, and the company claimed that _ the Waitomo should revert to: her original complement unless she were engaged in trade that took her into the tropics. ■'. , .. ~ The case for the union was that no agreement existed, that nine firemen were fully 'employed in the stokehold maintaining steam, and that it would be a, hardship on the men if the stokehol-d complement were reduced.

Evidence was heard from both sides. ■ No agreement having been reached at the hearing, the chairman decided that the stokehold complement of the Waitomo should remain as at present.