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Monday, July 31, 1972
LABOUR RELATIONS SERVICE HELPS SEITLE 741 DISPUTES
The Labour Relations Service of the Labour Department helped
settle 741 disputes out of a total of 1,050, during the second quarter
of this year.
This represents a settlement rate of 70.6 per cent.
Mr. T.F. Tsui, Senior Labour Officer in charge of the Division,
said today that this rate is high considering the fact that all cases
brought to the Service were dealt with irrespective of the rights and
wrongs of the parties.
As a result of the settlements a total of $807,414 was paid to
1,444 workers as arrears of wages, payment in lieu of notice under the
Employment Ordinance or as ex gratia severance pay.
Mr. Tsui said most labour problems arose out of disagreement
over wage rates, changes in conditions of employment, dismissals, prolonged
lay-off on redundancy and insolvency of the employer or simply mutual
misunderstanding.
Eleven strikes which occurred during the quarter accounted for
a loss of 6,558 man-days.
In settling 20 of the 25 big labour disputes, Mr. Tsui said that
officers of the Labour Relations Service conducted a total of 30 joint
meetings of an average duration of three hours each. They also made 48 visits to
the sites of disputes and a further 24 visits to sites of factory fires to
ensure that there would be no undue delay in the payment of wages to workers
affected by the fires.
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