TRAVELLING TIME RATES.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXIII, Issue 19453, 8 October 1926, Page 14

TRAVELLING TIME RATES.

PAYMENT OF BRICKLAYERS.

INTERPRETATION OF AWARD. Higher wages than those prescribed are not a substitute for tho payment of travelling time where the latter is incurred, according to a * judgment delivered by the Arbitration Court yesterday upon a case heard two days earlier. Robert McLaren, builder, of Point Chevalier, was prosecuted by the Inspector of Awards for an alleged breach of the northern district building trades award. It was alleged that defendant employed certain bricklayers on suburban work and failed to pay them the rates for travelling-time prescribed by the award. He paid a rate of wages in excess of the award rate; in some cases the rate paid was more than equivalent to the minimum fate, plus allowance for travelling-time and fares, which, in the circumstances, he claimed it was not obligatory upon him to pay. The Court, in its finding, states: —"Tho provision for payment of travelling-time and fare 3 is apart altogether from the provision for payment of wages. The award provides foi' a minimum rate of wages, which an employer is at liberty to exceed. If he agrees to pay a higher rate to his workers, he is, of course, bound to pay them for any overtime worked at a rate proportionate to the actual wages rate paid. This has long been settled law. "The payment for travelling-time and fares is in a similar position. It must necessarily be so, for if a worker, receiving a few pence an hour over the minimum rate, worked only for two or three hours on any day, he would not receive for that day tho equivalent of the minimum fate, plus his fares and travelling-time allowance. The inspector did not ask for any penalty, tho action having been brought for tho purpose of obtaining an interpretation of the award. A broach is recorded, but no penalty will be imposed."