THE INDUSTRIAL WORLD

Otago Daily Times, Issue 21040, 31 May 1930, Page 22

THE INDUSTRIAL WORLD

NEWS AND NOTES. By j. T. Paul. A DISMAL OUTLOOK. The building trades are having a very bad run_ so far as employment is concerned just now (writes “Industrial Tramp, m the Auckland Star), and in spite of experiencing a most phenomenally nnc autumn, when usually quite a lot of work is undertaken in preparation of a winter off-season, there are large numbers of tradesmen unemployed, with no prospect ot any betterment for some time to come. I do not remember (continues the writer) ever having seen before the number of unemployed carpenters ■ in attendance at the hall that I have noted during the last week or two. So marked has it become, that the trustees of the Trades Hall placed a waiting room at the disposal ot the union, where men in waiting could do so in comfort, so as to keep' them off the streets from the wet and cold showers, ihe corner of Hobson and Cook streets is a very busy looking place when noon approaches each day, as it is close to the Manna House, where free meals to the needy unemployed are provided by Sister Esther and her willing helpers. Such indications as these, to which may be added the opening of the Mission shelter and the results achieved by its bospitality, lead one to the conclusion that there is a dismal outlook for the rest of the winter. LABOUR DISPUTES AT HOME. The number of disputes involving stoppages of work, reported to the department as beginning in February in Great Britain and Northern Ireland, was 32, and compared with 33 in the previous month and 15 in February, 1929. The total number of workpeople involved in these disputes (including those thrown out of work at the establishments where the disputes occurred; though not themselves parties to the disputes) was approximately 9100. In addition, about 200 work people were involved, either directly or indirectly, in io disputes which began beI ebruary and were still in progress at the beginning of that month. The number of new and old disputes was thus 42, involving about 9300 workpeople, and resulting in a loss, during February of about 79,000 -working days. , UNEMPLOYMENT INSURANCE. From time to time it has been found necessary to amend the British Insurance Act, and some far-reaching alterations have been made since the advent of the Labour Government. The Labour Leader publishes the following criticism:— A serious development is occurring in connection with the new Unemployment Insurance Act which may have consequences almost as serious as the notorious disqualification under the old Act for , not genuinely seeking work.” . One of the provisions of the Insurance Act limits to those who are normally employed in an insurable occupation. This would seem to be an innocent definition, but the Courts of Referees are interpreting it m such way'that hundreds of unemployed persons are being refused beneht. If, for example, a man has been unemployed for a long period, three orfive years, the Courts of Referees are holding that he is not normally employed ? n insurable trade, and the benefit is being disallowed. Again, if a man Uas been employed in an insurable trade, but has taken odd jobs of a quite temporary character during his period of unemployment in order to earn a Tittle, the Courts of Referees are disallowing bene-

THE WORKING WEEK IN AUSTRALIA. AppHcation wa a made to the Commonwealth Arbitration Court recently by the New South Wales Commissioners for a variation to enable work to be rationed lor members of the Federated Enginednvers and i iremen’s Association. It was r« at l d ,i tbat , agreement had been and that employees were to reI 4 J 0?? .Pay for 44 hours’ work, wol£ ad tL 48 hoUrs pay for 44 hours’ snn The . ne V- arrangement will affect auu men. Application was made by the w Way l ' Commissioners ’to have the 44 to 48 . w °rkers increased from ***° . without any corresponding increase in pay. The men affected are emw«ren“« a tarl’' o, '“ 0M “ d »" ”«» t;^ Ud i e -i JUk i n rh^ wt ?. granted the applieaera are onrfT The - R ailways Commissionar® endeavouring to introduce 48 hours amf K®* 6 - m fhe railway service, m,nd ln the interests of the P a* rn hey are absolutely justified.” ua7Hi b^®f UggeS 1 fclon . of Jud 8® Lukin the - l d ,- d returned to court to fw a i\ at - they had agreed to the existing of bemg re-enacted with the addition of the courts order in respect to hours. an frder forts hour! 11 ® definitely made AVIATORS’ CONDITIONS IN AMERICA. An American trade union paper writes amo £ ng°rviatorH® rn “A S Wo J. kiDg conditions a „° ng V'ators:— “According to the DelO 000 liL 0 /, C . om^ < : rc ?- there are now over IU/JOO licensed pilots in the United States b°y ne mS Plane the of the Night n tJ T e ° f territory navigated. flyl ?? and mountain work always La /ate r f£ e * Latcly a d.fferenh“ ] b e « b n,M the wel eht of the cargo pm tmenf r by Some c °mpanies. Dethe ”run fc . ?f^° lnmt l rCe official « state that rn/L ” s r , a PPear to average about 400 miles, and a lay-over every third dav is generally allowed. When the Post Office hir P mS en il° Pe f rated transcontinental air .mail line from New York tn San Francisco the 45 flyers employed made in ™ ca S e 3) as high as £2OOO Since Uncle _ Sam s lines have been turned over t° P n Y at e enterprise wages have been cI d e U s Ced tn an dn the fly?rS com ,P elled . in many cases, to do repair work and perform other usually assigned to ‘ground

THE “DISRUPTION COMPLEX.’' ri^ c VPi ce is devoted in the New Leader to the conflict of opinion between RrV I £ d T Pe i ndent n Labour Part y an 'l the Rntish Labour Government. Under the fowing-— d mC the ast issue has the fo] " ° nl y. does the Cabinet demand ! V Slt j°y alt /. from the M.P/S while tb thp g IS ’4. in lts turn > responsible to the parliamentary party, the narliaH itself divorced from all fp, b9 f U - P “^ y ?, ontrol - Between conteiencea it is virtually supreme, a position the ’“worid! n ° ther Party in “While the Labour Party Executive repudiates the Continental form of party s° n [° ir^r eC^ e , and Government, it S „ under the leadership of Mac* Donald, Henderson, Thomas, Morrison. Kennedy (to name the principals), in full sail for the worst features of foreign obscurantism. The lessening of the shackles of party discipline abroad is rs.lnl n d - + an iocrcaaing intolerance in Orieat Britain, There has grown up an exaggerated and distorted conception of loyalty. The executive suffers from a disruption complex.” Socialism . and democracy have developed contemporaneously in tins country with freedom of speech It is this new cult of intolerance against which the I.L.P. should turn its guns. It is an infinitely more sinister development than much else that we complain about.

J( THE labour chancellor. “ .Mr Snowden is a Yorksliireman of the upper working class, and everything that tie is seems largely explicable in terms of those origins/’ Professor H. J. Laski says of the British Chancellor of the Exchequer in a long article in Harper’s Monthly. He has Yorkshire sincerity, Yorkshire obstinacy, Yorkshire dourness, and that queer half-melancholy humour of the north which at times partakes of tlio more metaphysical temperament of the ... I believe that 10 years of Mr Snowden at the Exchequer would give him a reputation as one of the pre-emi-nent Chancellors in Brutish financial history. His great qualities, integrity, sincerity, obstinacy are exactly what is needed for the post. . . . llis reputation will in the end be greater by filling the place he now occupies as it has not been filled since the days of Mr Gladstone. So long as he is there the middle class of England will feel that the Labour 1 arty is not a danger to its existence. Ko long as he is there, also, business

men will have confidence in the stability or the realm. Mr Snowden is the natural anchor of the Labour ship. It is a different post from that of the captain; but the anchor makes it possible for the captain to bring his boat safely into port.’ 1 EMPLOYMENT IN COAL MINES. At its last session, held at Geneva in February, the governing body had under consideration the report, of the preparatory technical conference on working conditions in coal mines, held at Geneva in January. The British Government representative pressed for the inclusion of the question of hours of work underground in coal mines in the agenda of the forthcoming session of the International Labour Conference, to be held at Geneva this month. Doubts were expressed by certain Governments, and by certain of the employers’ representatives, as to whether the report of the preparatory conference showed the existence of a suln-clf?ti.-mGasure agreement to justify the addition of this item to the conference agenda. .The representatives of oversea countries pointed out .that the preparatory conference had been confined to the coalproducing countries of Europe, and that, if oversea countries were to be asked to agree to the inclusion of the question in the 1930 conference agenda, it must Uc on the distinct understanding that any convention resulting from its deliberations should not apply to countries outside Europe, who had not been consulted, and as to whose law and practice the necessary information _ was lacking. The various views put forward were mu * 1 c ln a number of resolutions. , a ? .forward by the representative ot the British Government expressed the decision of the governing body to place the item on the agenda or the conference, and drew the special attention of the International Labour Conference to the tact that the question had been treated throughout as affecting only European coal mines, and that the additional information required to cover extra-European coal mining was not available. Thj= resolution, with the addition of one or two amendments of minor importance, was carI 1 ®? 15 . v .°. te ® to 5- The governing body also decided to submit a report on miners wages to the 1931 session of the International Labour Conference.