OFF-SEASON PAY

Waikato Times, Volume 125, Issue 20890, 23 August 1939, Page 14

OFF-SEASON PAY

FREEZING WORKERS SUGGESTION OF COMPULSION (By Teletrrapn.—pr**.>*s Association> CHRISTCHURCH, Tuesday The possibility of action being taken i>y the Government to compel freezing companies to contribute toward the upkeep of employees w the off season or to pay wages' “sufficient to tide them over” was mentioned by the Minister of Housing, the Hon, 11. T. Armstrong, in an address to unemployed workers in Christchurch. “We must expect to have unemployment in Christchurch in the winter because of seasonal occupations.” said the Minister. “Some of the newspaper editors and some politicians say that the freezing workers make such money during the season that they should have enough to tide them over. That is an old. old story. That may be the position of some workers in the freezing industry, but I should imagine that the majority earn just enough to keep them going while they are at work, without making any provision for tiding them over a few months. “The Government's policy is not to pay sustenance, because there should be useful and necessary work for everybody in the country, and I think the freezing companies should carry some of the responsibility. Tlijev employ some thousands of men and some of them pay pretty substantial dividends, and I do not think that the State should be called upon every year to tide them over until it suits the companies’ convenience to take the men back again. “The companies should be either lcoked to to take some of the responsibility of providing work or pay sufficient to enable the men to live for the season,” added Mr Armstrong. “That question will have to be gone Into very soon.”