ACTION BY THE WORKERS.

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

ACTION BY THE WORKERS.

AUCKLAND, January 7. The Star's Huntley correspondent wires that the Miners' Federation is cabling to Newcastle urging the unionists to stop supplies of coal for New Zealand companies. The Federation is also arranging a conference of the unions in Auckland, with a view to stopping the unloading of imported coal. It is stated that there is a probability of the southern coal miners being called out in sympathy with the northern coal 1 miners' determination not to submit to medical examination. The Waikato Miners' Union has decided to cite the. Northern Coal Company for creating a lockout and having failed to give the requisite notice. THK POSITION LOCALLY. Locally nothing serious in connection wit* the new Compensation Act has- eventuated, but the situation is full of possibilities. The position, so far a 6 the coalmineis ne concerned, remains unchanged. The employers will hold a meeting to-day to tVcide what shall be done in regard to Ihe medical examination asked for by the insurance companies. The employers, for their own sake, are, of couise, in favour, of insisting on the medical examination, but they recognise that to do so would ha . simply to precipitate trouble among tha men. Judging from a oonverea'ion a Times , lepresentative had with a mine .owner yesterday, it seems not unlikely that tho Otago employers will decide not to ask for the examination, and so accept the result* ing risk, in the hope that Parliament, when it meevs. will immediately amend the new law. "' The position,"' said the owner ml question, "is intolerable. We do not know -where we stand. The disease (pneumocomo&ie) is extremely rare, and, so far as my experience goes, is not contracted in coat mines. It sometimes attacks men engaged in quartz-crushing, and the danger is thab men who have been gold mining may secure employment in coal mines, and afterwards come on us for compensation But the chance is to remote that to insist on in-

the new act. None of them considered the matter as serious, and few, indeed, seemed to have given^it much consideration at ail. '* Uuder the circumstances," said Mr Blakeley, a member of Mr Andrew Lees' firm, I '" we will have to have men medically examined when they are given employment by us. But suppose a man comes on only for a day or two — you can see how extra- ; oid'nary the position becomes I have never known a serious case of lead poisoning 1 , and such case? sre extremely rare." Mr A. Gillies, president of the Mastei Painters' Association, was emphatic and to the point: "I have been 28 years connected with the painting trade," he eaid, "and in that time I have only heard of one case of lead poisoning, and I do not think that the trouble is prevalent in. the Dominion, t therefore, do not believe that the insurance companies are justified in asking the men to submit to an examination, or asking for an increase in the rates " Other master painters interviewed declared that if the medical examination was insisted on it would mean a serious lose and inconvenience to the employers in many ways. Then, again, it was likc-iy that the men themselves would object to submit t-hcm-solves to an examination. It was suggested that since the insurance companies had taken action regaining the painting trade, it wa-s likely that the plumbing trade, in which there was some possibility of poisoning by lead, would be similarly treated. Inquiries among the plumbers, however, showed that this was unlikely. The chief cause of lead poisoning j is carelessness on the part of the painters, j who get white-lead under their finger-nails | and neglect to remove it, with the result that it ultimately finds its way into their blood. Plumbers use much lead, but little j of tha pasty white lead, with 3 the result that, whiie they are liable to blood-poison-ing, it is U> a much lesser extent. It is unlikely, therefore, that they will be affected "in any way by clause 10 — that, at any rate, was the opinion expressed by the manager of an accident insurance company yesterday.