BOOT AND SHOE TRADE

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 80, Issue 245, 15 October 1937, Page 7

BOOT AND SHOE TRADE

AT PEAK OF PRODUCTION MINISTER’S STATEMENT v [ Per Press Association. 7 WELLINGTON, Oct. 14. ' "The New Zealand boot manufacturers are at the peak of their production and are employing the highest number of hands in their history,” said the Minister of Labour (Hon. H. T. Armstrong) to-day when replying to statements that the boot industry was in a perilous position as a result of competition from overseas. "Operatives employed in New Zealand boot factories on April 1 this year,” said the Minister, "totalled 3105, compared with 2376 in 1926-27, the year generally regarded as being the country’s year of greatest boom.’* TRADE’S VIEWPOINT MINISTER REPLIED TO POSITION NOT AS STATED [ Per Press Association. ] DUNEDIN. Oct. 14. ".If the Minister has been correctly reported he should know that thw position is very different from that outlined by him in his statement, and that the boot factories in New Zealand are not by any means employing as many hands as they would like to,” said a prominent representative of the Dunedin trade group of the New Zealand Footwear Manufacturers’ Association, when the statement made by the Minister of Labour to-day was submitted by an Otago Daily Times reporter for his comment.

"On the evidence that has been made available to the Minister,” he speaker continued, "he should be thoroughly aware of the real posh lion. One can go further and say that, full facts of the situation have been placed before the Minister of ndustries and Commerce and we can only surmise, after seeing the statement made by Mr Armstrong, that there is a surprising lack of co-opera-tion between Ministers.

"The position to-day, as far as boot factory employees are concerned, n worse than at any time during the depression, the speaker continuecr, "and one factory manager gave it as his opinion that in over 30 years’ experience he had never known the boot trade so bad as it is now. Ie has had, owing to lack of orders, to reduce his staff by 25 per cent, since the middle of September and the remainder of his staff is working only half time. Another factory manager reports that he is working with lest than half the staff he could employ under better conditions. Prospects foe the immediate future offer nothing at all.” Going on to deal with the Minister’s charge that manufacturers were importing shoes instead of making them, the representative of the group stated that this could not be reconciled with the actual position. The policy of his own firm, which was one of the largest, was to import only those classes of footwear which it could not manufacture itself. He described the contention of the manager of another business, that “a man must buy in the cheapest market,” as not being applicable to the trade generally.