The Dominion. FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 22, 1911. EMPLOYERS IN CONFUSION.

Dominion, Volume 4, Issue 1239, 22 September 1911, Page 4

The Dominion. FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 22, 1911. EMPLOYERS IN CONFUSION.

The pessimistic tone of the Presidential address to the New Zealand Employers' Federation and of the general report'presented to the delegates is not without justification, but it is less striking than the futility of the whole of the proceedings. It is perfectly true—and every banker will endorse Me. Harold BeauCHAJip's repeated 'statements as Chairman of Directors of the Bank of New Zealand—that while there.is a good deal of money awaiting investment, investors will not be tempted into putting their money into those businesses which are under the shadow of the Arbitration Act. The difficulties of employers are increasing, as the Federation's president pointed out, tfnd their profits are decreasing. How could it be otherwise? Small as is the force represented by the agitatorß amongst trades unionism, it is sufficiently large to have a very material influence on the framing of legislation. The result is that employers-are not only harassed in numerous directions and loaded with plogging restrictions, but live in constant fear of further oppressions. It is mainly a fear of the future that is preventing • the proper development of our manufacturing industries, and producing the curious spectacle of an almost complete stoppage of new investment in industry in one of the most heavily protected countries in the world. The Federation realises all this. Stress is laid in the report upon the extreme variety of the means whereby Parliament, which is nowadays merely a formal assembly for the enactment of the Executive's ideas, can harass and handicap the employer; and a pathetic surprise is expressed that the protests of the Federation—"vehement" protests sometimes, it is said —have failed to make any impression upon the Government. Surely it should be the business of the Federation to take up these facts and concentrate its attention upon them.

But what does it do?" It fails utterly to 00 to the root of the matter. The detailed criticism of the various ''labour" enactments that is supplied in the report is' vigorous and pertinent, but it is entirely useless. The wanton oppressiveness of some sections of Shops and Offieei; Act, tlio doctrinaire cruelty of more than one section of the Coal Mines Amendment Act, the deliberate handicap' of Section 9 of the Mining Amendment Act, and the simply destructive character of the Tramways Act of last year—these are all very properly enlarged upon; but will not tho Federation find itself next year deploring the fact that despite its "vehement protests" yet no relief had been granted, while the employers' diflicultios had increased! AVhcit is the sundering influence that prevents the cniployors from realising, in addition to other difficult circumstances, the necessity for clear and whole-hearted action against the forces that threaten the whole future .of healthy industry! Thcso forces,

as wo sec them, arc these: (l) on I the one hand, the false pride, on j the part of the honest section of the. J so-called "Liberals," and the cynical strategy, on the part of Labour agitators, that work upon the timidity jOf a "bluffed" public to prevent the substitution of tho Canadian arbi- [ tration system or the Wages Board system for the Arbitration Act; and (2) on tho other hand, an essential disunion amongst employers, who, although as a class their interests are the same, yet cherish the hope, individually, that they .may somehow thrive in this industrial Babylon even though their fellows may suffer. The Employers' Federation, if it realised that year by year the employer's lot becomes worse, and threatens equally to become still worse to the disadvantage of everybody, could, if it chose" to go the right way about it, do much to break down the false pride and obstinacy of the "Liberals" who maintain an Arbitration Act that they dare not enforce against militant Labour. And if it realises that individual self-seeking is useless, it would seen evolve that union which is strength. At present the Federation is disorganised and chaotic; itis manifestly paltering with what is a question of life and death, not only to industrial capital, but to labour itself and to the community as a whole.