TRAMWAY STRIFE IN AUCKLAND

Wanganui Chronicle, 6 March 1947, Page 5

TRAMWAY STRIFE IN AUCKLAND

STRIKE PISTOL HELD AT BOARD’S HEAD (P.A.) Auckland, March 5 Failing a settlement of their c’ainis by 5 p.m. next Monday, employees of the Auckland Tiansport Board will bold a stop-work meeting. This decision was contained in a resolution passed unanimously at largely-attended meetings of the Tramway Employees’ Union. The Transport Board’s proposals were rejected by the meetings on the qround that none of the main conditions c'.rimed had been answered, although some of them had already been granted in other tramway centres in New Zealand. The minimum claims, as set out in the resolution, passed at each meeting, were for payment of 3s per shift for any work which was required of the men outside the normal 7.45 a.m. to 4.30 p.m. working day—this sum to be in addition to their weekly wage; for employees working beyond midnight to be paid at double rates for the period after that time; for employees working in pits (that is maintenance and cleaning work underneath the tramcars) to be paid Is 6d per shift, in addition to their wage: and for the procedure of morning broken shifts, finishing their work on the completion cf the middle relief duties on Saturdays and holidays .to continue as in past years.

The resolution also provided that al! other claims which the union had made should be held over, pending negotiations for the national agreement, which will commence in Wellington on March 18; and that the present negotiations with the Auckland Transport Board be confined to the local provisional agreement to ho retrorpective to December 1. 19*16. and io be observed until the National Agreement is concluded.

Speakers at the meetings emphasised th ' lone delays that had arisen over obtaining the new agreement. It was claimed that the board’s figures were grossly distorted. t