STAFF REDUCED.

Waikato Times, Volume 113, Issue 18947, 17 May 1933, Page 8

STAFF REDUCED.

POLICY OF NEW MAYOR.

COUNCILLORS INDIGNANT.

NEW PLYMOUTH, Tuesday

The new Mayor of Stratford, Mr ,1. W. McMillan, who .was elected by the toss of a coin after a tie in the voting at the recent election, was subjected to some hostile criticism from a section of the council at a meeting last evening, and when he brought forward a motion for reorganisation of the staff and a review of salaries and wages it met with vigorous opposition. On the casting vote of the Mayor, the motion was carried, and the council went into committee to deal with further resolutions concerning salaries of borough officers. The meeting did not terminate until 12.15 a.m., when it was announced that the engineer, Mr L. B. Davis, the electrical engineer, Mr A. E. Moss, the parks curator, Mr S. Taylor, and four members of the streets staff had been dismissed, and the resignation of another had been accepted. The savings in salaries and wages, with the addition of cuts in the salaries of a number of other council employees, are calculated to total £ISOO a year. Mr G. R. Finnerty said the Mayor’s reorganisation resolution was the most astounding and far-reaching he had known during his experience of local bodies. It was nonsense, he said, to think of dismissing the staff, some of whom had given over 30 years’ service.

Mr Harkness, to the Mayor: It was said you were put here by the ratepayers, You were put In by the toss of "a coin. It. is an insult to our intelligence to ask us to accept the resolution. An amendment, that the question be referred to the Finance Committee was defeated on the casting vote of the Mayor.