A PRIVILEGED TRADE

Observer, Volume XXIX, Issue 46, 31 July 1909, Page 3

A PRIVILEGED TRADE

Plumbers and Their Charges

THE fact that it has been possible for the plumbers' bill upon a contract for alterations to a private house to mount up to the remarkable sum of £472, as was sbown in a law-suit that was before one of the Auckland Stipendiary Magistrates the other day, has forcibly impressed upon the public mind the idea that plumbing work in Auckland has become a costly necessity. Possibly it may be proved in that particular case that the charges were fair and reasonable. That is the question which the courts have to determine, and as the matter is sub judice, having been removed into the Supreme Court for trial, it would be neither s&emly nor permissible to enter here upon any discussion of the questions at issue. After all, however, the case in question is merely a straw floating upon the surface of public affairs, and indicating the direction of a current ■which is running pretty strongly in the industrial world.

be certificated tradesmen. Consequently, a builder was entitled to employ any licensed journeyman plumber upon such jobs, paying him, of course, the recognised trades union wages.

Lately, however, a new interpretation of the sanitary by-law has been discovered and enforced. Builders have been informed that no work will be passed by the inspectors as satisfactory, unless it has been carried out under the supervision of the holder of a master plumber's certificate. Consequently, those builders who have in the past purchased their own materials, and employed competent journeymen plumbers to do the work, subject always to its being passed by the Corporation inspectors when completed, have been driven into the arms of the master plumbers, who have practically acquired a vested right to all the sanitary plumbing work done, in the city. No wonder, then, that the established plumbers are able to demand profits which the builders and architects consider unreasonable, upon both materials and labour.

Whether it is desirable that such a state of affairs should be allowed to continue is another matter. -t might fairly be supposed that journeymen certified as competent by the city's own sanitary department could fairly be trusted with the execution of work that has, after all, to satisfy the tests of the corporation inspectors. "Where is the value of the official license if the person who holds it has. to be subjected to double procautions in order to ensure the proper quality in his work ? Besides the Corporation's inspector he would also have the owner's architect to satisfy, and surely these precautions ought to be sufficient without the imposition of an additional employer's profit upon the shoulders of the property owner. A sanitation sy :- tern is an excellent thing for a city, but it. may be obtained at too henvy a price, if anything anrroacV'.g. monopoly is allowed to exist.

The plain fact is that something like a tug-of-war is going on between the plumbers of Auckland on the one hand and the builders and architects on the other, as to the reasonableness or otherwise of the plumbers' current tariff of charges. Quite a number of disputes regarding contractors' bills for ' ' extras ' ' are being hung up indefinitely because the architects decline to certify to the owners that the prices levied upon them in respect of plumbing material and labour are fair and reasonable. For example, it is stated that though journleymen plumbers are allowed by the Arbitration Court's Award a wage of 12s a day, the master plumbers claim the right to take ■upon their outlay for wages a profit of 50 per cent., and accordingly charge the builders under whom they sub-oontract at the advanced rate ol 18s per day. Similarly, there are dielicate questions awaiting settlement with regard to profit which, in charging for extras, shall be allowed in respect to material sup--plied The present scale erf charges is maintained by the plumbers as a body, and resisted by the builders as a body, who are supported by their architects, and until one side Rives way or some middle course is discovered, the deadlock will continue.

So much by way of index to the -troubles that are agitating the bmldand investing world— and which -principally, of course, concern the investor, who has to pay the piper in the long run. The public are, however concerned with another phase ,of the matter. For it is owing to measures which were taken by the City authorities professedly in the public interests that the master plumbers are able to. take up their present dictatorial attitude. The sanitary regulations have elevated the master plumbers into the position : t a highly privileged trade. Until recent years it was considered suincient to require that the plumbers -engaged upon sanitary work should