Labour’S Deferred Pay.
p. 48 · Read in the full issue
How New Guinea Harasses Employers.
THE readiness of the New Guinea Administration to handicap private enterprise is illustrated by a change that has been made in the method of providing for the deferred pay for native labour.
Under the old system, New Guinea did the same as Papua—that is, the employer of native labour had to lodge with the Administration the amount of his native labourers’ deferred pay, every three months, in advance. Under the new system, employers are compelled to lodge the full amount of the deferred pay for three years (£7/4/-) in advance.
Where a man has a considerable labour line, the sum required represents a serious drain on cash resources.
Furthermore, it represents a large sum of money lying idle, so far as the em ployer is concerned —though the Ad ministation probably makes some use
of it. Evidently, the whole body of em ployers is being penalised for die mis deeds of a few.
The effect of the present arrangement is to seriously discourage small enter prises. The indifference of the Admin istration towards that fact is an illus tration of the extraordinary policy that has been in operation in this Territory for many years..