FOOTWEAR TRADE PLAN

Southland Times, Issue 24433, 13 May 1941, Page 6

FOOTWEAR TRADE PLAN

Minister’s Statement Criticized

The statement telegraphed from Nelson, in which the Minister of Industries and Commerce (the Hon. D. G. Sullivan) stated that the footwear industry had by a majority vote decided to operate under an industrial plan, was described yesterday as both mischievous and misleading by the Leader of the Opposition (Mr S. G. Holland). Any person reading the Minister’s statement would conclude that a majority of the firms engaged in the footwear - industry had voted for working under the plan, whereas, in fact, considerably less than half of the footwear factory proprietors voted in favour of the plan, said Mr Holland. Mr Sullivan was well aware of that fact. The public was entitled to expect Ministers to tell the whole story and to give the public the whole of the facts. The Minister knew the full facts, whereas the public did not. “The reason Mr Sullivan did not do so on this occasion is obvious because he did not wish to disclose the fact publicly that considerably less than half of the factory proprietors voted in favour of the industrial plan,” continued Mr Holland. “When a vote is submitted to an industry under the provisions of the Act this vote is taken under two headings. First, a vote is taken of the proprietors engaged in the industry concerned, and in the footwear industry a majority of the factory proprietors did not vote in favour of the plan. The votes are also counted on a basis of the number of employees engaged in the industry. On this counting a very small majority was obtained, but the Minister was silent in explaining this fact.

INFORMATION SOUGHT “I am sure the public would be interested in knowing the full details of the voting by the footwear industry and I accordingly invite Mr Sullivan to publish the following information: (a) The percentage of proprietors entitled to vote who voted in favour of the plan, (b) The percentage of proprietors entitled to vote who did not vote in favour - of the plan, (c) The percentage of votes recorded in favour of the plan according to the employees engaged in the industry. . (d) The percentage of votes not recorded in favour of the plan according to the employees engaged in the industry. "The voting recorded in this instance draws public attention to a most unfair provision against which strong protests were made when the Bill was before the House,” said Mr Holland. “It is clearly intended to operate against the smaller factories and in favour of the big employer, as one employer, say, 501 workers, can out-vote 20 employers employing 500 workers. In such a case as this the Minister would be far from justified in stating that the industry had by a majority vote decided to support working under a plan.”