ARBITRATION COURT

Hokitika Guardian, 8 February 1921, Page 4

ARBITRATION COURT

STATUS OF THE JUDGE,

WELLINGTON, Ki-b. 3. The Attorney-General has issued the following statement: —

‘‘There seems to exist some misapprehension as to the status and position of the Hon Mr Justice Frazer, whs has recently been appointed Judge of the Arbitration Court, and my attention has been called to some paragraphs which have recently appeared in certain newspapers suggesting that the Government imposed conditions in the case of the present Judge, rendering the position he holds, in some aspects, inferior to the position of his predecessors in office. That is not the case. The Government has neither the power, nor the desire, to impose any such conditions. The Industrial Conciliation and Arbitration Act, 1908, provides expressly that a Judge of the Arbitration Court shall, as to tenure of office, salary, emoluments, and privileges (including superannuation allowance), have the same rights, and be subject to the same provisions, as a Judge of the Supreme Court, and it also provides that the Arbitration Act shall operate as a permanent appropriation of his salary. His Honour, therefore, has all the rank, privileges, and immunities ol a Judge of the Supreme Court. But, by other provisions of the Arbitration Act and its amendments, a Judge of ' the Arbitration Court may, on an emergency, be appointed to be a temporary Judge of the Supreme Court, to perform the ordinary functions of a Judge of that Court, and, alternatively a Judge of the Arbitration Court may be appointed permanently a Judge of the Supreme Court, and bo called upon to give part of his time to the duties of that Court. It is considered by the Government to be inadvisable that the Judge of the Arbitration Court should be detached from the business of that Court to assist in the ordinary work of the Supreme Court when the work q.l the latter Court falls in arrear for any reason, and before the offer of the appointment was made to Mr Fraser ,it had been decided by the Government that the work of the Arbitration Court ought not to be interfered with and delayed by any exigencies of another Court, and that, therefore, in future, the Government would abstain from exercising its power of utilising a Judge of the Arbitration Court for the purposes of the business oi the Supreme Court. Mr Frazer was notified of that decision, and of the reasons for it, when the offer of the appointment was made to him, and he entirely agreed with both decisions and the reasons for them.