IDLE SKILLED HANDS

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 759, 4 September 1929, Page 6

IDLE SKILLED HANDS

PLEA FOR THAMES LOCO. WORKERS MR. SAMUEL’S APPEAL (THE SIN'S Parliamentary Reporter) An eloquent plea for the men who have been displaced from employment at the locomotive factory of Price Bros, in Thames was entered by Mr. A. M. Samuel (Thames). He said that the action of the Government in not giving some of the locomotive work to Price’s had resulted in skilled tradesmen having to walk the streets. In Thames there were families literally starving, and yet there were rumours of the Government giving locomotive work to firms outside New Zealand. The Minister of Railways (the Hon. W. B. Taverner): That's not true. Mr. Samuel said he was glad to hear that, and went on to refer to the accumulation of repair work at shops in New Zealand —work which could easily be carried out by Price’s. In one shop in particular there were units piled up, and men were working overtime. The workers at Thames were unfit for relief work, as they had been trained along particular lines. Hunger was hunger, and could not be appeased by promises. No sophistry could turn a bread and water meal into a banquet. Replying to Mr. Samuel’s remarks, Mr. T. W. McDonald (Wairarapa) said that the Government had been blamed by Mr. Samuel for the state of affairs in Thames. Mr. Samuel forgot that the reorganisation of the workshops in New Zealand at a cost of over £2,000,000 had been carried out by the Reform Government.