CASUAL WORKERS

Southland Times, Issue 22997, 17 September 1936, Page 8

CASUAL WORKERS

HOLIDAYS ON FULL PAY (United Press Association.) Hastings, September 16. “Surely casual workers are not entitled to holidays on full pay?” asked Mr C. H. Slater, when the question of holidays was under discussion at a sitting of the Conciliation Council in Hastings concerning the fruit-packers’ industrial dispute. The Commissioner (Mr M. J. Reardon) : Yes. That is the law at the present time. Mr Reardon then read extracts from the Factories Act, which provided that any person employed in a factory within 14 days of a holiday must be paid for that holiday. “Do you mean to say that if I engage a man on a Monday, and Thursday is a holiday, I must pay him for Thursday?” asked Mr Slater, “Yes,” replied the Commissioner. “That is the law, as I understand it.” “But what if he works for someone else on the Tuesday and another man again on the Wednesday? He’s only a casual employee, you know,” said Mr Slater. The Commissioner said that the payment would be proportioned among the three employers. He pointed out there was little doubt that when framing the legislation there was in the minds of the legislators the attempt made many years ago to defeat the law, and so that this would be practically impossible it had been necessary to make the condition apply to an extreme case.