WATERFRONT HOLD-UP

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume LXV, Issue 19550, 4 February 1938, Page 14

WATERFRONT HOLD-UP

EMPLOYERS’ STATEMENT MEN REFUSED TO WORK BREACH OF AWARD (Per Press Association.) WELLINGTON, last night. Replying to a letter by Mr. J. O. Johnson concerning the recent waterfront delays, Mr. W. H. S. Bennett, manager of the Wellington Co-opera-tive Waterside Labour Employment Association, referring to the working of the Port Campbell, states that clause 19 of the award, which is mandatory, provides that the men shall work during meal hours when required. The order to work during the tea hour was given at 4.43 p.m. to the men in No. 1 hatch, and the only answer given was a refusal, except for two men in the hold, who agreed to work during the meal hour. The employer then discharged the men. This is what any employer would do in the case of his employees refusing to obey a just and proper order. •

“Mr. Johnson then says that no attempt was made to obtain substi- - lutes, but he is well aware that in I previous cases of gangs refusing to I work in the meal hour, other gangs on the ship invariably refuse to take the place _of the gang that declined to work,” Mi-. Bennett continues. “Transfers are not allowed after 5 p.m., and as no labour, either union or non-union, was available, the crew were engaged to work No. 1 hatch. This procedure has been adopted before, and the union men in other hatches continued working. Refused ,(o Resume “The gangs at Nos. 2,3, and 4 hatches returned to work at C p.m. as ordered, but when they discovered the crew working on No. 1 job, the

delegate, on behalf Of the men, informed the employer that they would cease work unless the crew were discharged. The employer could not agree to the men’s demand, and as they ceased work and definitely refused to resume, they were discharged.” As regards the Rangatira’s fruit cargo, Mr. Bennett states that the ship’s foreman said he told the delegate for the steamer’s men at about 8 a.m. on Monday that there was fruit to land, and the delegate replied that the men had decided it was too wet to work. The delegate admits this and referred the question to the men alongside the steamer, but they again declined to work and returned to the waiting room. Alluding to the claim that officers Of the union were told nothing until Thursday, Mr. Bennett says that Mr. Johnson presumably does not remember the Union Company’s wharf superintendent ringing him personally on Tuesday afternoon and saying that he proposed to discharge the fruit on Wednesday, picnic day, with permanent men, seeing that no union labour would be available, and Mr. Johnson assented to this course.