FREEZING WORKS EMPLOYEES

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume XLVII, Issue 15366, 10 November 1920, Page 3

FREEZING WORKS EMPLOYEES

A telegram from Hastings yesterday stated, that the freezing workers of lomoana, Pakipaki, Whakatu. and the j North British works had rejected the offer of the employers to increase the present cost of, living bonus by 12£ per cent. A similar decision has been arrived at by meetings of the men employed at the Tokomaru Bay works on luesday week last, Gisborne on Friday night, and the Waipaoa works on Monday night. A Herald representative waa informed to-day that last year the men were paid the following .bonus upon the basis of the agreement of April, 1919: Hourly workers 10 per cent., piece-workers 7£ per cent. This year the employers' had offered : Hourly workers 2Jsi per cent., piece-workers 20 per cent., equivalent to a 12£ per cent, increase on the two. It was this offer the men had declined. The men were demanding 7d ami 9d per hour for certain hourly and weekly workers, and 15 per cent, for pieceworkers, in lieu of the existing bonus. The various replies are being submitted to the Federation at Wellington, where the negotiations are being carried on. Locally there has been no threatened action of withholding from this season's work unless better terms are offered.