TEXTILE CONFERENCE

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXIV, Issue 22878, 5 November 1937, Page 15

TEXTILE CONFERENCE

Sir, —In reply to the article in Tuesday's Hkrald regarding the Geneva Conference. Mr. H. T. Armstrong, tho New Zealand Government delegate, was chairman of the committee on the textile industry and on the first day of its sitting the employers as a group, with the exception of France and the United States of America, announced that they "could not take,part in the discussion or drafting of, or voting on any article of a proposed draft convention." Mr. Armstrong, in the report of the committee's work, pointed out, " although the committee were entitled to the assistance of the employers, just the same as they were entitled to the assistance of the Government and tho workers' representatives, wo did not receive that assistance at all." The Government delegate of America said, " I may say, with a conviction born of our experience, that a week not longer than 40 hours is good for our textile industry . . . .It has even been argued

theoretically that a larger market for textiles and a shorter work-week with higher rates of pay are mutually exclusive. We do not agree." The adviser to the employers' delegates, United States of America, made statements whieh do not agree with the opinions of Mr. W. E. Anderson, the New Zealand employers' delegate. This adviser states " the draft convention for the textile industry sets forth the principle of the 40-hour week without establishing those rigidities of application which would make operation under it onerous. The variety in character of the industry has been, recognised, and sufficient latitude has been, provided to take account of seasonal fluctuations. Administrative flexibility to accommodate practice and custom is embodied in the article. There has been noticeable at this conference a degree of astonishment, and in some quarters a measure of pained surprise, that a textile employer should bo favourably disposed toward a 40-hour week ... It has been suggested that conditions in the United States of America, are entirely different from those obtaining elsewhere. Permit me to say that competition is no less keen on the American Continent than in other parts of the world, and while 110 doubt we give many evidences of being irrational and imprudent, those of us who are responsible heads of business enterprises are actuated by the same necessities as those which dominate the conduct of business the world over. . . . It can thus be seen that an insistence upon the preservation of the 40-hour week was not the result of a theoretical chimera." N. Lewis.