FREEZING WORKS

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 75, Issue 179, 1 August 1932, Page 8

FREEZING WORKS

WAGES AND CONDITIONS THE CONCILIATION STAGES A DOMINION CONFERENCE WELLINGTON, July 30. The Conciliation Council, presided over by Mr W. Newton, yesterday commenced to hear the dispute between the Wellington Meat Export Company, Ltd., applicant, and the New Zealand Freezing Works and Related Trades Industrial Association of Workers and the Wellington Freezing Works an< Related Trades Employees’ Industrial Union of Workers, respondents. The employers’ assessors were Messrs H. S. E.’Turner (Christchurch), A. Suter (Auckland), J. T. Rogerson (Longburn>, and J. J. Evans (Wellington), and the employees were Messrs J. Blair. P J. Kelly, A. McLeod, and A. Baker. The employers’ case was conducted by Mr C. G. Wilkin, and the employees’ by Mr W. E. Sill. Some time was spent in checking over the parties cited, Mr Newton pointing out that while previously the Council had had no power to sign agreements, its decisions could now be birding on all parties, and it was therefore necessary that all intended parties must be definitely cited. It was clear that there had been no preliminary conference between the parties prior to drawing up the proposals. The wages offered by the employers showed a considerable’ reduction. The workers did not agree with the employers’ proposals, and filed the Northern. Taranaki, Wellington, Marlborough. Canterbury, and Otago and Southland freezing works related trades employees’ award, with certain amendments, as a basis for counter proposals. Mr Wilkin said that the employers had considerably consolidated the old award in presenting their proposals, reducing some 40 clauses to 14. This, he said, would simplify proceedings. Mr Sill contended that the consolidated process had not succeeded in making matters more intelligible, rather the reverse, so much so that he was hardly prepared to reply to the points raised in the sequence presented, as he would have been if the old grouping had been followed. Mr Kelly remarked that it was chiefly the altered conditions and rates of pay which were objected to. While some time was spent in discussing working hours, and their incidence in the case of shifts, it did not appear that either party was not willing to eome to some arrangement regarding the points raised in this connection.

The Wages Issue The killing rates offered by the employers, with the northern award rates on which the employees’ proposals were based in parentheses, were:—Sheep not otherwise specified, £1 9s (£2) per 100; lambs not otherwise specified, £1 6d (£1 17s 6d), ram lambs included in employers’ proposals; show sheep and lambs, £1 14s (£2 6s); sheep unshorn after December 30, rate and a half (double rates); dead sheep or lambs (each;. 6d (Is 3jd); all cattle other than bulls, etc. (each), 2s (2s 7d); bulls and stags (each), 2s 3d (3s Id)); dead cattle (each), 5s (8s); calves (each), 3d to Is 6d (7d to Is lid) according to weight; pigs (each), is Id to is 4d (Is 4d to Is lid). Wages per hour offered by the employers were as follows, the rates claimed by the workers being shown in parentheses:— Slaughterhouse and Cooling Room Assistants. —Boners after first year 2s (second year boners 2s 2d); boners on piece work, beef, 5d (10d); cooling floor hands, including gutmen, Is 9d (2s Id, gutmen on piece work 4s 5d per 100). Fellmongery.— North Island 5s 6d per 100 (8s per 100); limers, Is 9d (2s IJd) j pelt classers, Is lid (2s 3fd); freezing chamber hands, Is lOd (2s 3d); preserving boners, 2s (2s 4sd); casing scrapers, 2s (2s 6d class A). The rates for boys offered were:— Under 16 years of age, 17s 6d (£1 10s); between 16 and 17, £1 5s (£llss) • between 17 and 18, £1 12s 6d (£2 ss); between 18 and 19, £2 5s (£2 15s). Proposing the adoption of the wages offered, Mr Wilkin said that it was a case of the ability of the industry to pay. It might have been able to do so in the good years from 1924 onwards, but r t now. It was a question whether the men could accept the boning of bobby calves, for instance, at 3d each, or whether the industry could proceed. In many cases the farmer would not put the calves in unless his share of the proceeds was larger. It was admitted that the rates offered halved the old rates. Mr Kelly remarked that it had been J bought worth while by the Government to subsidise the building industry in the interests of employment. Per I haps this would be possible in the case of the bobby calf industry. Contention of Employers For the employers it was stated that this was not an industry like that of boot manufacture, where the cost of production had a good deal to do with the selling price. The price in this case was fixed by conditions in other parts of the world, and the product prices had declined to such an extent that the old basis of wages was'now impossible. A good deal had been said of the 10 per cent, cut in the wages, and it had even been assumed that this went, into the pockets of the companies. So far from this being the case, not only the product by some of its by-products had so declined that the difference in the price of runners to-day would more than : absorb the whole of the 10 per cent. ; cur. in the wages. By-products alone bad dropped £690,000 in the industry, as a whole, so that not only had the 10 per cent, cut been swalloyed up, bat another half million as well. It was contended that in former years, when the slaughtermen were killing from 130 to 140 head a day, the earcases were better dressed, and the men cut themselves less, probably because they were more keyed up to their work. Mr McLeod: We did not get all this from you when we were doing those tallies. Mr Kelly said tba? hi.-: experience was that when the big tallies were being more generally done the dressing was not so good as it was to-day. Mr Baker said that the man who could not do 1 carcases properly naturally trying to do more than he could to keep up with the 140 man.

There were plenty of men who could not do more than 100 properly, and if they pressed their work they did not do it well. Mr Turner said that he believed in some incentive to effort. He believed that most of the men could do more than 100 a day, and, even though the wages offered were less, by doing more they could earn the same pay. Mr Baker: Yes, and kill themselves doing it. Mr Sill remarked that if a slaughterman went 4 ‘all out” at what was admitted to be hard work, then he should get more than the ordinary worker for it. I It was submitted for the employers that double the rate of pay should meet that, and for the employees that ; another solution would be to increase the pay of the wages men. For the employers it was pointed out that the lower grades of wages had not been cut 10 per cent., but only 6£ per cent. Bridging the Difference The Commissioner pointed out that very little advance bad been made since the council had opened, and suggested that some steps be taken to bridge the difference between the 29s per 100 offered by the employers for otherwise unspecified sheep, and the £2 which the employees stood out for. Mr Wilkin suggested a Dominion conference. The present dispute concerned only one company, and he thought that if all the phases of the industry from both sides were presented, it would speed up an agreement. Mr Sill agreed with this view. It was decided that the parties themselves, without the Commissioner, should arrange a conference in Welling ton on Attest 10. and arrange for the presence of representatives from different parts of the Dominion, with the idea of coming to a Dominion agreement. The hearing of the dispute was held over till the results of the Dominion conference were known. i Pleasant in taste —effective in action —you’ll be enthusiastic concerning the i remedying properties of NAZOL PAS- ! TH .LES for coughs, colds, sore throats land Catarrh. Hold at the popular I price of 1/3 per box.*