FIBROUS PLASTER

Otago Daily Times, Issue 26199, 9 July 1946, Page 4

FIBROUS PLASTER

CITY FACTORY CLOSING SIXTY HOUSES HELD UP Because of the impossibility of obtaining further supplies of gypsum for several weeks Dunedin’s only remaining fibrous plaster factory is closing down this week. Another factory in the city ceased to operate a little over a fortnight ago. The closing of the factc/ry will mean that practically 50 men will be thrown out of employment, and that the construction of more than < 60 houses in the city will be held up for an indefinite period. The general shortage of fibrous plaster materials is preventing the completion of other building work, and is viewed with considerable concern by the trade. It is not expected that further supplies of materials will come to hand until the middle of August, and the Dunedin factory finds that it would entail too great a financial loss to keep its men on the pay roll. When shortages occurred recently it found it possible to keep paying its men, many of whom were able to obtain other employment. Since Christmas, however, the factory has been working only half time because of the lack of materials, and it is now felt by the proprietors that they cannot afford to pay their men for an indefinite period while awaiting supplies. The men employed in this particular factory are trained hands, many of them specialists, and it is difficult for them to obtain suitable alternative employment. At the same time, the firm is faced with the problem of losing trained men to other types of employment. Much as it regrets the step, it feels that it has no choice but to take the course of closing the factory completely until adequate supplies of material arrive.