STRIKE THREAT

Timaru Herald, Volume CXLVI, Issue 21324, 19 April 1939, Page 8

STRIKE THREAT

Dunedin Tramwaymen DIFFICULTIES SMOOTHED OUT By Telegraph—Press Association DUNEDIN, April 18. The stoppage of all city trams was threatened for a time last evening owing to a dispute over a new timetable. but at the last moment the union announced that a proposed stopwork meeting had been abandoned, as the Tramways Committee of the City Council will meet the men this morning.

It is understood that a delicate situation was averted as a result of departmental intervention. During the afternoon, Mr C. L. Hunter, Labourt Department liaison officer in Wellington, arrived by aeroplane, conveying a message from the Minister of Labour (the Hon. P. C. Webb) that the Government would view gravely a persistence in the intention to strike, but that the Government was prepared to do what it could for the men.

The union’s grievance is that the new service is too fast, increased motor traffic preventing care and running to time, giving no spare time between runs, and cutting down the meal-time. The dispute was amicably settled at a conference between the parties this morning. The conference was one of some duration, but all points at issue were fully discussed and all misunderstandings removed. The conference was characterised by the best of feeling on both sides. The final outcome of the conference was that a 12-minute service instituted on the St. Clair. Normanby and Anderson’s Bay Gardens routes would be extended to 15 minutes. By the adoption of this altered schedule, the Council would continue to economise in running costs. The alteration to the running of cars on those lines would come into operation on Thursday week. The Council gave the union officials a definite guarantee to make every endeavour not to dismiss any of the staff. If. after making every endeavour to retain its present staff, it found it could not do so, the Council agreed not to dispense with the services of any employees without first holding a conference with the union.