STOPPAGES IN MINES

Otago Witness, Issue 3426, 11 November 1919, Page 26

STOPPAGES IN MINES

MANAGEMENT BLAMED

LEGAL PROCEEDINGS URGED,

(From Ouk Own Corbespondent.)

WELLINGTON, November 4. Mr Holland asked the Minister of Labour in the House to-day whether he would instruct Labour Department to take proceedings in connection with the recent stoppages of work at Pukemiro and Nightcaps' mines. Mr Holland gave an account of the circumstances which had preceded the stoppages of work, and declared that the blame was on the manager for irregular conduct. Stress was laid on the Pukemiro ease where, it was alleged, the manager had refused the men's inspector the right to enter some old workings. When the department's inspector inspected the place he found in the workings a high percentage of black damp (carbonic acid gas—a gas which is poisonous or asphyxiating if breathed, but not combustible). The stoppage of work had occurred when the men's inspector was not allowed to enter the workings. At Nightcaps the case was very similar. Certain miners complained of bad air and heating by fire. The union check inspectors were not allowed to make an inspection until the manager himself had made an inspection and sent the men home. The manager then called in the men who built the stoppings. He held that proceedings should have been taken against these managers. Mr Ell said that in view of these serious statements the Government should make immediate inquiry into these cases. As the question was one the Minister of Mines rather than the Minister of Labour. Sir William Fraser replied to it. He sa'id that the demand made by the men at Pukemiro to #ic mine manager was one which the manager thought at the time he was entitled to resist._ He allowed men to go into these workings, and' it was then that the other men went out and stopped work. The manager thought he was acting within his rights, and acting in this wrong belief he resisted the demand of the men, but now the. miners were asking in a vengeful spirit that the mine manager be prosecuted. There was nothing to justify such a course. No harm had been done to anybody. If a mine manager had intentionally and determinedly broken tho law the position would have been different, but he had not done anything of the kind. What would be tho result of such an action? —merely to allow

the men to take vengeance on the mine manager

Mr Holland: You have no right to Bay that. He declared that there had been danger to life in the mines. The Minister said there had been no serious danger to life. There had been no explosive gas in the workings. The Minister made no reference whatever to the Nightcaps case.