LABOR ROTES.

Gisborne Times, Volume XXVII, Issue 2652, 6 November 1909, Page 3 (Supplement)

LABOR ROTES.

,(By Unionist.)

Tlie Auckland Hotel.and Restaurant Employees' Union, established on, the Bth October last year, nas uoav a mem-ber-shin of 77U. The Union took part m the trades procession on Labor oay, and Avas awarued second prize, its display consisted ot two lorries fitted up as a kitchen and dining-room, on which an elaborate menu Avas prepared and ser-, ved Avliiie the procession was in progress. • i x 1 An agreement has been arrived at between tne Dunedin Tailoresses’ Union and the employers concerned in connection Avith the dispute in the trade. The agreement, Aviricn is to be maac .01 . award, provides for a general increase ot 2s 6d per Aveck tor permanent -hands, and increased prices for pieceAVork. , Mr. T. Walsh, the Labor candidate, polled onlv oi4 votes, as against 143 b secured by the successful candidate at the. municipal by-election held at Auckland last Aveek. . The Arbitration Court Avill not be called 11 non to intervene in the dispute betiveen'the fiax-mill employees and the amployers in the Canterbury district. Mr. Triggs has arranged a Avorxing agreement tor presentation to the court to be made an award, in addition to providing for the ordinary flaxmill hands, the agreement also fixes the hours of labor for Avorkers engaged m the manufacture of rope and twine. In the flaxmilling branch a week’s ordinary Avork is not to exceed 48 hours. Drivers and' lorrymen are to be paid from £2 2s to £2 5s per Aveek., Mill foremen are to receive £2 10s per Aveek. A daily wage from 7s to 8s is to be provided for A r arions classes of feeders, Avliiie other ordinary Avorkers are to reoetoe from 6s to 7s a day. Piecework prices are allotted for certain kinds of Avork. Scrutchers receive 20s a ton, or a minimum Avage of not less than Is lid per hour. Proportionate Avages are allowed, for youths and a conditional clause is also embodied in the agreement. . Wellington holds the position of having the largest number of unionists in the Dominion, the numbers being: Wellington district, 16,272; Auckland district, 11,608; Canterbury district, 9643; Otago district, 8052; V' estland, 2998: Nelson, 343; Taranaki, 264 j and Marlborough, 185; or a total ot 49,347 for the Dominion. . The number of members in the Employers Unions in the various districts are":—Canterbury 1349, Auckland 802, Otago 793, Wellington 745, Taranaki 78, Marlborough 66, Westland 29, and Nelson 11; or a total of 3918. Sixteen Avorkers’ unions and sixteen employers’ unions failed' to send in any returns as required by the Act, and their registrations have therefore been cancelled; this leaves 235 Industrial Union of Workers registered in the Dominion. These slaughtermen avlio Avere fined for striking seem to be a source of annoyance to the authorities. r lhe annual report of the Department of Labor devotes about half a page of figures te the fines and payments. The' penalties totalled £1330, a- five pound fine being inflicted on each of 26b men. The Department has received £776, and is still in a state of expectancy. Last year’s Arbitration Act has a back-action, Avhich is expected .to come in useful Avhen the delinquents return from Australia. There are tivelve pledged Labor representatives in the Tasmanian State Assembly. Avhich consists of thirty members. This is the first occasion on which Labor has been in power in the State. In the last Parliament of thirty-fi\-e members there Ai’ere only seA-en Laborites. The constitution of the E'ederated Carters and Drtoer’s Union has now been adopted by the Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, and Adelaide Unions. A Chinese candidate having beeu.successful in passing an examination for appointment as a fitter in the Post-master-General’s Department, the question has been asked whether the CommonAvealth Civil Service is open to Asiatics at all. The regulations of the Civil Service haA-ing been consulted, it was discovered that providing a candidate who passed' an examination was a natural-born subject of th© King, and fully qualified technically, his appointment could not be blocked. The Chinese examinee has provided evidence that ho is a natural-bom subject of the King. His admission to the Civil Service, therefore, must folloAv as a matter of course. This decision opens the door to the whole Indian race, as well as to the Chinese of Hongkong and the Strait’s Settlements. The 'Auckland Trades and Labor Council Conference delegates AA r ere in r sfcructed to do their utmost.to secure the next year’s Trades and Labor Conference to meet at Auckland. It is acknoAvledged that the effect of so many of the pick of the Dominion unions meeting in any place is to give a great impetus to unionism in that place, and it is felt that Auckland benefitted greatly from the Conference of 1902, Avhich was held in the Auckland City • Council Chambers during the regime of Mayor Kidd; since then the location of the annual Conference has always been in a southern city, the dates and places being:—l9o3, Gx-eymouth; .1904, Christchurch; 1905, Wellington ; 1906, Christchurch; 1907, Dunedin; 190 S and 1909, Wellington. There is some interesting information to be' obtained by a perusal of the return presented to both Houses of the General Assembly, shoAving the number of members in each Industrial Union registered under the Act, to 31st December, 1908. Waihi no longer holds the pride of place as having the largest number of members in a trades union in the Dominion, the Wellington Wharf Laborers’ Union registering 1888 members ' against the Waihi Miners’ Union quota of 1273. The only other unions in Noav Zealand that run into four figures are the Canterbury and Otago Amalgamated Societies of Raihvav Servants Avith 1075, and 1064 members respectively, and the Wellington branch of the Australasian Federated Seamen' with 1002 member’s. The smallest union in the Dominion is the Auckland Female Typesetters’ Avith a membersliio of four, Avho are all employed in one printing office, the Auckland “Observer.” The existence of this union dates from the first Auckland Compositors’ AAvard, griffin under the presidency of Mr. J. C. Martin, on June 6th, 1900, in Avhich the members of the Female Typesetters’ Union are named in the Second Schedule thereof, so that, it is in the pathetic position of being finable to increase its membership. It therefore only needs four defections from . matrimonal or other causes, and the Female Typesetters’ Union would cease, to exist. - •