FARM LABOURERS DISPUTE.

Otago Witness, Issue 2804, 11 December 1907, Page 21

FARM LABOURERS DISPUTE.

TIMAKU, December 3. I The Conciliation Board resumed the I hearing of the farm labourers' dispute to- . day. Robert Guthrie, grazing runholder ' and member of the Mackenzie County Council, gave evidence on his experience , of 30 years as shepherd, manager, and runholder. He said that the hut accommodation for mustercrs ought to be multi- '. plied, and better arrangements made for feeding them. The wages paid now in < ' hill country were about equal to those ' demanded. Ho condemned the' union's * proposals to abolish the co-operative family ' by making fathers pay their eons union ' wages, to fix the hours for shepherds, to ( do away with ocntract work, and to compel ( preference to unionists. These were im- i . practicable in the back country. I , Henry Thomas Day, 'aged 65, a day ; labourer on farms in Temuke, 6aid his i pay, 6t 6d a day, was not enough for a 1 man with a family. He disapproved of < piecework as tending to sweating, but he could not «ay how men whom farmers ' would not engage at day rates were to ■ get on. ■ P. J. Jleane, aged 30, a general farm ' band, supported the demands, though in a ! publio address some months ago he de- . Tided the holidays and fixed hours demanded. He said he would abolish piecework except in shearing. December 4. , The Farm* Labour Conciliation Board was occupied to-day with two witnesses repre- ] senting the interests of hill runholders, ■ Messrs G. J. Hamilton and W. D. Acland. ( Both were certain that Jua. satiafsfitprv awaid . i

could be made affecting hill stations, and thought the industry, as an industry, would not bo injured, but the harmonious relations now existing between employers and employed would be destroyed, and the latter would suffer through *he former being- harassed by petty restrictions. j