Day 180 - 31 Oct 95 - Page 54


     
     1        the employment contract, if you go back 10 years, was not
     2        really so well developed, and there was, you know, more
     3        generally, there was an understanding, this is a rest day,
     4        that is a workday.
     5
     6        This flexing of contracts, which is a feature of the late
     7        80s to 90s, has come with abolition of Wages Councils and
     8        other statutes, because when the statutes existed, then
     9        almost by definition one particular day was the rest day.
    10        Once the statutes were abolished, it is an open season on
    11        what is the rest day, if you follow my general meaning.
    12
    13   Q.   Yes.  The identification of the rest day was no longer a
    14        matter of vital importance?
    15        A.  No, there was no -- all the contracts of this period
    16        were underpinned by statute, could not pay less than
    17        statute, annual leave, page 646 -- sorry, not 646, 648
    18        helps to explain, again it helps to answer again your
    19        question.  Paragraph 6 on page 648 shows you in the
    20        left-hand column the length of service in the year ending
    21        31st March, that year, and then the various tumbling
    22        columns there show the number of days of the normal working
    23        week.
    24
    25        So, if someone typically worked a straight five day week,
    26        after 48 weeks service they get 20 days paid leave.  This
    27        was all statutorily enforceable.  In fact, the farm workers
    28        current holiday provisions are the same as this, more or
    29        less.  So, if you did more than five days per week, in
    30        other words, six or seven, you would have additional
    31        holiday benefits on top of the five day week person.
    32
    33        If I could say in parenthesis, you know, the two respective
    34        sides of that Wages Council, that is, the employers
    35        represented through the primary Employers' Associations,
    36        the restaurateurs, the hoteliers and so forth, 21 of them,
    37        and the trade unions represented by the five main trade
    38        unions, including my union, 21 of them, would meet ex
    39        parte, but these details, the 5. -- no, the 2.053 pence an
    40        hour, you could spend two days trying to get it up to 2.06p
    41        an hour.  You could spend hours trying to negotiate
    42        marginal improvements into these variation provisions.
    43        They counted for a great deal in the industry, and I am
    44        talking about the employers' organisations every bit as
    45        much as the trade union side.
    46
    47        As I am sure you are aware, in the way that that tripartite
    48        system worked, the pendulum was operated by the
    49        independents, the three independents, and they would
    50        examine the arguments put forward by both sides at the 
    51        Annual Review of these provisions, and they ------ 
    52 
    53   Q.   You say the three sides, the Employers' Associations?
    54        A.  Yes, the trade -------
    55
    56   Q.   The five main trade unions and?
    57        A.  And then three independents.
    58
    59   Q.   So how many were there on a Wages Council?
    60        A.  45.

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