TOTE WORKERS.

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume LXXVI, Issue 17779, 30 January 1920, Page 6

TOTE WORKERS.

DEADLOCK WITH EMPLOYERS. UNIONISM TO BE SOUGHT. Says the “Auckland Star”: The latest section of the community .o be imbue.l with tie idea of unionism is the totalisator employees, wliicii can number in its ranks clerks, accountants, and school teachers, etc. At present the affairs of this party are carried on under an authority styled the Auckland Totalisator Employees’ Association. They are after higher wages and improved working facilities, and state that they are forced to seek the advantages to be had from the industrial statutes of the Dominion through the employers refusing to meet them in conference to consider matters which they wish to Have remedied. Negotiations re a conference have been proceeding between the employers and the employees for some time past, in fact almost since the association was formed six months ago, but the stumbling block in the way of it being satisfactorily arranged, according to the employees is the fact that the employers will only meet the association as a whole to discuss the matter. This the association is up against, for they consider that no good could possibly come of such a meeting, and hold to their decision to be represented at a conference with the employers by say, four of their number. The men claim that totalisator turnovers have trebled within the last three years, but the staff handling this vast sum of money has only been strengthened to the extent of about 15 per cent. Further, they claim that with the taking over of the tote at Ellerslie by the Auckalnd Racing Club, the wages were increased approximately 50 per cent, more than the contractors were paying. They recognise that in the former case the employers are working on a full 7 J per cent, basis, whereas the latter are working under a contract. Nevertheless they contend that they should be receiving higher wages for the very responsible duties they carry out, and hope that by forming a union, a definite scale of wages will be fixed. Th-? high cost of living has also given the movement a push along. In more ways than already enumerated do they hope to benefit. The facilities at quite a number of the courses they say, are not up to what they are entitled to. The deficiency, of course, they do not attribute to the tote-worker employers, but to the racing clubs. However, they hope to have the conditions made satisfactory. The present membership of the association is approximately 100.