WHARF LABOURERS' MEETING.

Otago Witness, Issue 2861, 13 January 1909, Page 29

WHARF LABOURERS' MEETING.

THE MINERS SUPPORTED. (From Our Owk Correspondent.) GREYMOUTH, January 6. The Grey Wharf Labourers' Union, at a special meeting to-day, passed the following resolutions: — "That this meeting congratulates the R-eefton miners on the stand they have taken in refusing to submit themselves to a medical examination. ' and we hope to see them get the moraJ and financial support of every union in the Dominion during the time they may be locked out by their employers from the benefits they would be entitled io if m- ■ jurcd from the Workers' Compensation Act of 1908. and we trust that no worker 1 will ever agree to contract himself or his dependents out of the benefits of the < said act." " That it is a recommendation from the Greymouth Wharf , Labourers' Union to the Waterside Workers' Federation to favouraMy support the Coal and Gold Miners' Federa--1 tion in its efforts to resist the medical , test." i In a telegram to the Prime Minister Mr Semple states : " Pneumoconiosis is a disease that takes a number of years to manifest itself, and yet, according to section 10, subsection (1) of the new act a claimant must show that the disease was contracted within 12 months preceding incapacity or death. We are of the opinion that the proof required would lead to litigation rather than to the benej fit of the claimant. That being so, seci tion 10 is of very little benefit to the j miner, and the extra liability imposed i upon employers is very small. " It is cvii dent that the employers are after a geneI ral examination, and the effects of such I an examination would be so far-reaching j ! that it would be impossible for the i workers to ever agiee to the same, and i it seems "to me that if this is insisted on i we will be forced into an industrial conj flict, which may spell disaster to both , parties and the Dominion generally."