TENSE MOMENTS

Timaru Herald, Volume CXLIV, Issue 20932, 11 January 1938, Page 6

TENSE MOMENTS

DOUBLE-CROSSING AND “ TWISTING ” ALLEGATIONS AGAINST EMPLOYERS By Telegraph—Press Association CHRISTCHCURCH. January 10. Allegations of a union representative of “double-crossing” on the part of a section of the employers, and a further allegation that one of the employers had “twisted,” made the opening minutes of the Plasterers’ dispute in the Conciliation Council this morning tense. After a private conference with the Conciliation Commissioner, Mr S. Ritchie, Mr D. I. Macdonald, representing the firms employing fibrous plasterers, withdrew.

Application was made by the Christchurch Plasterers’ Union for an award. Emphatic objection to some lastminute counter-proposals lodged by Mr Macdonald was made by the union representatives, who refused to recognise Mr Macdonald's claims in the dispute.

When the meeting opened, Mr Macdonald announced that he proposed to submit counter-proposals on behalf of three employers. “There seems to have been some double-crossing somewhere.” commented a workers’ assessor, Mr H. Harris. “We are certainly not going to accept them.”

Mr Macdonald: If the counter-pro-posals are not accepted, the whole of the proceedings will be objected to. Mr Harries: By whom? Mr Macdonald: By the people I’m representing.

Mr W. C. Pollard, an employers’ representative, explained that a meeting of employers had been called and everyone was notified of it. Certain proposals had been agreed to, and he thought it was only a matter of coming along to-day to reach a settlement. Now Mr Macdonald had come along with other proposals, but he was three weeks late.

Mr Harries pointed out that there were 130 plasterers In the union, and that only seven were employed by the minority, as represented by Mr Macdonald. They should go to the Court for exemption. After a private discussion between the union representatives and the Conciliation Commissioner, which lasted for more than an hour, Mr Ritchie formally appointed the assessors with the exception of Mr Macdonald. An almost complete settlement was reached in the dispute. The only section on which a settlement could not be reached was that concerning underrate workers, and it was decided that this point should be referred to the Arbitration Court. The hours were fixed at 40 weekly, these to be worked between 8 a.m. and 5 p.m. on five days in each week. Only two classes if workmen—journeymen and apprentices—were recognised in the agreement, and the minimum rate of wages for all journeymen plasterers was fixed at 2/10 an hour. Overtime rates were agreed on at time and a half for the first three hours and at double time for more than three hours. It was decided that piecework be prohibited, and no work would be sub-let on a labour only basis.