Jobless pool a pressure to end dock labour sch‹

HULL PORT employers are trying to build up 'a reserve pool of unemployed labour like they had before 1967', claim local union officials.

Notices returning 15 tallymen-all with more than five years' service - to the unattached. register expire on January 14.

Their return to the pool was reluctantly agreed by the port's union-management Dock Labour Board following a decision by Brown Atkinson Ltd to give up their stevedoring activities in the port.

Just over two months ago, the bankruptcy of another company swelled the unattached pool to 38. Now the WEATHER A TROUGH over N England will move southwards during the day.

Scotland, except the S, will be mostly dry with sunny periods, apart from scattered showers in the far Nand W.

W Scotland, N Ireland and N England will have some rain in places at first, but it will become brighter during the day.

The remainder of England and Wales will be cloudy witn rain and drizzle in places but dry, brighter weather is expected to spread slowly S during the day.

It will be mild generally but temperatures in W and N Scotland will be about nurmal. Outlook for Wednesday and Thursday: Blustery showers, chiefly in the NW, followed by a period of more prolonged rain spreading to all areas.

Temperatures near or above normal in the N, generally mild in the S. employers have used the slump in trade passing through the port to place 53 men there.

According to the Transport and General Workers' Union, the Hull employers are repeating the arguments used by their opposite numbers in Liverpool and London about the need for compulsory severance.

Major change

This would require a major change in the 1947 Dock Labour Scheme and a complete reversal of no-redundancy pledges given by the employers during the 1967 decasualization.

'And we've got the wrong government in power at the movement,' commented one T&GWU waterways official yesterday.

The National Dock Labour Board has made provision for up to 185 voluntary redundancies in the port. Offers have been sent out to every docker on the port's 4,500strong register.

But the deadline for these runs out on December 29 and so far - with unemployment in the town already above the national average at 5.2 per cent-there is no sign of a rush.

Officials of the Board admitted yesterday they will be 'very lucky to reach the target'.

Talks agreed

At national level, however, T&GWU chiefs have openly agreed to talks about relating the size of the register to the changing labour requirements.

This could be the start of an attempt to condition dockers into accepting what the union's leaders have for some time been discussing privately with the employers: abolition of the 1947 scheme.