CONCILIATION & ARBITRATION.

Dominion, Volume 5, Issue 1498, 22 July 1912, Page 4

CONCILIATION & ARBITRATION.

The President of the Arbitration Court, Me. Justice Siji, is severely handled by the Auckland Labour publication, The Voice of Labour, of Julv 12, in connection with the Christchurch Furniture Trades Union case. Accordiug to this paper, the President of the Court, "in reply to_ argument, that the clause regarding apprentices should be retrospective, as are all others, was pleased to intimate that he could administer tho law, but 'could not provide the union representatives with brains.' " The Voice of Labour regards this remark as extremely offensive, and says so in very plain language, and passes some severe strictures on the President's attitude generally. While most people will sympathise with Mi:. Justice Sim in the very difficult and often thankless task which he has to perforin, and in connection with which he Ins at times been most unjustly attacked, the protest of the Labour pape" in the present case is not without justification if the facts are as stated. Such n remark as reported is quite uncalled for, and is hardly likely to 'promote that spirit of conciliation which the Court should b>. desirous of fostering. Moreover, the union representative in the case u question, Mit. Mortuitii'i can hardly

be accused of being the stupid person his Honour's remark would seem to ' implv; on the contrary, he is one of ' the shrewdest of the Trades Union secretaries. The probabilities are that Mr. Justice Sim, like most of those who have preceded him in tlu office, is very weary of the position he occupies as the head of the Arbitration Court, and occasionally grows impatient. It is, as we have remarked, a thankless office, full o£ little irritations and petty annoyances; but it is nevertheless a matter of vital importance to the industries of the country and to tho welfare of the whole community that the duties pertaining to it should not only be in the hands of capable men of sound judgment, but those men must be in a position of absolute independence of all external influences. That _ione of the reasons why it is so desirable that a member of the Supreme Court bench should be the President of the Court. It seems to be generally recognised that some amendment of the cxistiug law is necessary, unless the Act is to break clown utterly, and the change that suggests itself as the simplest and most satisfactory is to provide means of bringing the employers and employees together to settle their own disputes on the lines of the Wages Boards in Victoria, or some similar scheme. Better machinery might be provided, for instance, whereby representatives of employers and workers in any industry could meet under the presidency _ of a conciliator, and as far as possible arrange their differences. Eoth sides being represented only by experts, they could quickly get down to bedrock, and if any points should arise on which agreement proved impossible, a Judge of the Supremo Court, in the particular district in which the case occurred, should then be called in to settle such points as remained in dispute. This would spread the work amongst the different Judges and shorten the length of the cases when they did come before the Court. But the chief advantage would lie in the possibilities of settlement amongst the employers and workers themselves in the initial stages of a dispute owing to the elimination from tho proceedings of all but the experts and the conciliator, who would simply act as chairman, without any voice in deciding the terms of agreement.