AGRICULTURAL AND PASTORAL WORKERS' COLUMN.

Otago Witness, Issue 2691, 11 October 1905, Page 35

AGRICULTURAL AND PASTORAL WORKERS' COLUMN.

NOTES AND GENERAL INFORMATION.

By Steve Boreham.

Seeing by advertisement that good ploughmen are required by local labour agents, and knowing that a large number ot good men are at present out of employment in Dunedin, I made it my business the week to ascertain the reason why the men preferred to remain idle when a situation might be had on application to any of the labour agents. After being assured by Mr Skene, labour agent, that it is difficult to secure the services ol ploughmen, and that he had on his books a number of situations to fill at the time of speaking to him, I interviewed several ploughmen at present in the town idle, with the result that every man spoken to gave as his reason for not taking the situations offering that the aceomn, dation on a large number of farms is not fit for human habitation. They had no complaint to make about the food or the rate ot pay offered, but, as one man said, they looked for something more than wages and tucker: they wanted reasonable places to sleep in -after their day's work was done. One farm hand, and a good ploughman, said he did not care to yarn about his reasons fpr not taking the situations at present; offering, but that he would write .to me and give me his reasons for remaining" id\e in preference to running' the risk of meeting a premature death if he were to accept employment *on some of the farms.' The following is an extract from his letter:— "l have several complaints to make regarding stations and tarins. I might state I follow up farming, ploughing, etc., and the state of the accommodation that a man has to put up with is altogether unbearable. I have been employed on several places* recently, but have had* to leave on account of the accommodation. The 1 housing is only sheds and barns, without any fire, so that a man is unable to dry his clothes when he gets wet; and many a man has been laid up, contracting inpurable complaints, owing to this cause." This is, he goes on to say, one reason, and the most important one, why so - many farmers are unable to get men. 'He suggests that were ' a health inspector to pay an occasional visit to the country and inspect the sleeping quarters of the men employed by the farmers he felt quite positive he .would condemn the majority of sleeping places. He goes on : "The fact of it is the cattle are better housed and cared for than the men." Now in my -opinion we have in this man's letter the -sole .reason why men are lotK to~take a constant job on a farm," and the sooner this state .of affairs is altered the better it will be for the larmers themselves The farmer must not forget that there is a- difference between his permanent hands i»nd 'the-'casual harvesters or threshing mill hands. The^fxyrmer very rightly expects that his accommodation sliall be comfortable, seeing that r it is, practically speaking, his .home; /whereas the casual man is ?here to-day and .gone to-morrow. In order to -remedy this state_ of affairs, and encourage -bather than (discourage farm hands from :takiug work on the farm, I would- strongly -advise farmers to provide proper' accommodation.-for their permanent hands;: either this, or be prepared to advertise for ploughmen in vain. The -shearing will now soon be on, and in consequence the -writer would strongly advise country workers to hang out in the country for a -few weeks -longer, when probably there will' be plenty of work. It is well that my readers should be aware of, the fact that there arc plenty of men in Dunedin at present capable of doing all the work in hand or anticipated. It is only a Government promise, after all, that the work of duplicating the Dunedin-' Mosgiel line will start at an earjy date. - The chances are that the work may not start for some months, if at all. It will be remembered that the same work was supposed to be put in hand just prior to last general election, so that men will be wise to put no faith in this project. In any case, were the work Ho be put in hand to-morrow, there are plenty of men idle in town to fill all requirements;* for, notwithetanding anything that may be said to the contrary, there are at least 300 men idle at the present time. By this it will be understood by those who are idle in country districts that it is hopeless to come into town -with the -idea of getting work, and therefore the better plan would be, as stated- above, to hang on until the shearing starts, when .no doubt most men in the country will be fully- employed. The officers of the Sheep .Owners' Union 'doubt.' the ; truth of a statement which appeared in the daily papers some time back to the&- effect that -most, if not all, the jNbrth Ota'gb sheds were going to pay 16s Sd per hundred for shearing this coming season. Farther, the secretary of the Owners' Union contends that were this so the sheep owners paying 16s 8d would be liable for breach of award. I again state that many of the sheds in the North Otago district aro going -to pay the price stated. I should also like to assure sheep owners that they will bo committing no breach of the shearers' award by paying 16s 8d per hundred. " All awards made by the court so far fix what shall be the minimum wage, and not what Mr Pram erroneously tbjnks is a maximum wage. It therefore follows that owners are perfectly within the terms of the award when they pay any sum for shearing per hundred above 15s, the price fixed by the award. We, as shearers, of course, acknowledge "we are bound by the award, and on no pretence whatever would •we be justified in demanding a greater price fqr our labour than that set forth in the award. There is, however, nothing an the award that prevents us from accepting a price for our labour not below that fixed by the court. Speaking for myself, I would much rather arrive at a wage to be mutually agreed upon than have recourse to a third party, and therefore the action of the North Otago squatters is. to my mind, a step in the right direction, and will certainly tend to strengthen the shearers' confidence in those sheep owners ■who by their action in this direction are fiving'us practical proof of their desire to c fair, and give us some consideration ■when the profits from their produce warrant them doing co. There can be no 'denying the fact that our squatters have had the greatest difficulty during the last 12 or- 15 years in making ends meet. The surprise to the writer is, when we come to .calmly consider the obstacles squatters have ihad to contend against during that time, 'that so many of the old identities are .still

to be found hanging on to their stations. Not many years ago squatters were expected to feed, and did feed, the unemployed, work their stations up to the demands of the rabbit inspector at a yearly cost of thousands of pounds, and at least on two occasions, to my knowledge, a great number of back-block stations were in some cases completely depleted of stock owing to heavy falls of snow. With these difficulties to contend against, and wool bringing from i 3d to 4d per,Jb, the back-block squatter is } a settler we^-have some reason to feel satisfied with; and peisonally I wish to express my gratitude to those of them in the North Otago district who have thought it right, now that they are getting a fair price" for their wool, to give U3 an increased wage, and this, too, when we have no claim whatever to ask for or expect more than the wage fixed by the court. Speaking for myself, I can assure those ..giving the increase that their action will not be forgotten by me.