MELBOURNE WATERSIDERS

New Zealand Times, Volume XXXVIII, Issue 8646, 3 February 1914, Page 5

MELBOURNE WATERSIDERS

REFUSAL OF DEMANDS. AN EXPLANATION. ' By Telegraph—Press Association —Copyright MELBOURNE, February 2. Mr Northcote, chairman of the Commonwealth Steamship replying to Mr W. M. Hughes’s criticism of his reasons for refusing the demands for higher pay, said that if Mr Hughes’s argument was sound it must apply not only to the shipowner, but to every employer of labour throughout Australia. The pastoralist must, irrespective of the season, provide a living wage for all those required at any time by him if he should have an extraordinary season. The master builder must do the same in order to meet the emergencies of a brisk building trade, and the the agricultural implement maker, and every manufacturer must do likewise. Certainly the new doctrine is one which the shipowners, with the knowledge of what it means to them in the first instance, and to the public of Australia finally, are not prepared, to accept. Every penny per hour increase granted to the wharf labourer means to the iuter-Stato shipping companies alone not less than £60,000 per annum.