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KALGOORLIE MUNICIPALITY.
Sick Pay Clause in Agreement.
The State Arbitration Court yesterday
gave its reserved decision upon an appli
cation by the Mayor and councillors of
the .municipality of Kalgoorlie for in
terpretation of clause .5 of Industrial
Agreement No. 12 of 1937, which was
made between the applicants and the
Eastern Goldfields Municipal and Road
Board Labourers' Union.
The clause reads:-"Twelve days sick
pay per annum on half rates on account
of sickness shall be granted to all em
ployees, a doctor's certificate to be pro
duced on each occasion a man i1 off
sick. Sick pay shall not be granted for
more than 12 days in the aggregate for
any year."
"That clause," said Mr. President
Dwyer, "is very badly drafted, both gram
matically and otherwise. In its present
form I can come to no other conclusion
than that it reads so as to permit 12
days' sick pay on half rates to be granted
to a worker whenever his illness occurs
after he enters into a contract of ser
vice. When that illness occupies only
half a day, of course he gets only half
a day's pay, and so on. But if the whole
12 days occur, say, a month after he has
joined the service of the municipality,
then he is entitled to those 12 days at
half rates. So the clause reads. This,
it will be noted, is not the usual sick
pay clause occurring in awards made by
this Court, where the sick pay is appor
tioned regularly so as to allow half a day
per month with an adjustment at the
end of every calendar year; but the part
ies have drafted their own agreement
they have drafted their own clauses m
the terms that I have quoted--and they
must abide by it."
Messrs. W. Somerville (employees' re
presentative) and C. H. Lamb (employers'
representative) agreed with the decision.
Mr. S. Howard Bath appeared for the
Mayor and councillors of Kalgoorlie.
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