POOR REWARD

Timaru Herald, Volume CLVIII, Issue 23322, 4 October 1945, Page 4

POOR REWARD

Wartime Invention Railwayman Given £5, Less Tax (N.Z.P.A.) WELLINGTON, Oct. 3. A blacksmith, Edward Davies, after his transfer to the drawing office at the Hutt Railway Workshops, designed a machine which greatly increased and cheapened the output of screw pickets used in the rapid assembly of barbed wire entanglements in the front line. Fcr his idea and work on the machine, he told the Railways Industrial Tribunal he received £5, less tax. The Department said it was Army policy, and a direct saving to the Army and not to the railways, he said. Mr E. A. Whitlow, railwaymen’s representative on the Tribunal, said that Davies no doubt appreciated having done a good job from the war point of view, but more practical recognition would have been better. William Robertson, workshops superintendent, agreed that if any idea was developed in the Department’s time by a railway employee it became the Department’s property and could not be patented. He thought that initiative and ability should be encouraged. Mr Whitlow said he was impressed with the inadequacy of the recognition. “Don’t you honestly think so?” he asked Mr Robertson. “I admit it was a splendid idea—a brainy idea,” replied Mr Robertson. “If you ask me straight out, it should have received greater recognition.”

Replying to Mr E. Casey, Government representative on the Tribunal, he said that the Departmental Committee, which included a fitter from the workshops, dealt with suggestions and made its recommendations to the General-Manager. The chairman. Mr W. F. Stilwell, S.M., said it was not necessary for the Department to reply to the points raised. It was just a side issue that had developed and proved nothing substantial from the Tribunal’s point of view.