INDUSTRIAL CONFLICT

Hokitika Guardian, 30 July 1929, Page 7

INDUSTRIAL CONFLICT

BY N. The determination of the Commonwealth Government to abolish the Arbitration Court may. be but a prelude to the abolition of the arbitration system altogether. Mr Justice Frazer is now’ on a visit to Australia to investigate the position, and his report will no doubt be well worthy o»f consideration before a definite conclusion is arrived at. But the indications all point just now to a revulsion of feeling against the unwieldy, costly and unsatisfactory system which has in time evolved from the admittedly praiseworthy efforts of the old Liberal Government to promote industrial peace. It may be questioned whether peace at any price may not be unsound, and against the public interest, but There is no question that, when the price is paid and the peace is not forthcoming the writing is appearing on the wall warning that the whole system hasbeen weighed in the balance and found

wanting. At the Industrial/Conference last year the Labour delegation made an admission which may w’ell he noted. Their report says: “Both employers and employed are the victim of a system which has organized industry on the lines of a tug-of-war, and permeated the whole national life with sectional habits of thought and outlook. Wherever coercion has been applied by one side or the other it has called forth a resistance that otherwise might never have arisen, and has led to much sterility and waste. The two sides rarely meet except to make demands of one another, or to compromise conflicting claims, and negotiations are inevitably carried on as between two hostile bodies. . . . The parallel rise of trades unions and employers’ associations in mutual opposition has reached a point.where it is generally recognized that the normal condition of tlr world of industry is one of suppressed war.”

Quite so!-But a state of “suppressed war ” is no good to anyone. If all the conciliation and arbitration can only lead to the/suppression of an industrial conflagration with no possibility of putting the fire out, is the constant running around with the ineffectual fire extinguishers provided by the legislature worth while? A flare-up is “ suppressed”, in one place only to be (followed by a break out in another. The cost of this industrial fire suppression organisation is increasing year by year —cost to the Government and the country, cost to the employers’ associltions, cost to the labour unions. And the result is nil. The, workers are no more satisfied now than they were vears ago; the employers are more and more reluctant to launch out in any competitive enterprise; and investors are more and more determined to leave industrial investments severely alone. The futility of Arbitration Court awards to maintain an industrial peace has just been exemplified by the strikers in Australia. Also just now in Vucklnnd the trawler crews are out on strike while a Conciliation Commissioner is endeavouring to get the owners to give away something to tide over the difficulty until the Court can make a new award which the..strikers may or may not elect to work under. Of course no one questions the right of any worker to refuse to work for the wages ir under the conditions offering. But the question that leads to all trouble is whether a worker who won’t accept these conditions or wages is to be alo’.ved to prevent any other worker ac-.-epting them. This fact must be faced .is the whole’ unionist system is based in coercion of the non-unionist. Now whatever wages an Arbitration Court may fix, these wages will not and cannot be paid unless the worker is able to earn them. If the Court could fix prices as well as wages the wages could Jf course be put up provided the selling price of the produced article was put up proportionately. But this cannot be done by the Court, and in many cases cannot be done by the employers. I'he selling price of an article is fixed at its value in the open market. li Employers’ Associations . were in fact what they are erroneously termed hut can never be, Unions of Employers, they cannot by combination raise the value of commodities beyond what others are prepared to sell them for. ti they were to attempt to prevent others selling goods for less they would soon be in very serious trouble. There can lie no coercion in this direction, o while the question of wages is bound up with that of profits and the Court or any other tribunal attempts to fix wages and ignores the economic factor of profits altogether it is simply attempting to solve the insoluble and reconcile the irreconcilable. It is simply at present making industry—or that section of it which its awards affect — more and more unprofitable, less attractive to investors, and less able to pay good wages. i he terms peace and prosperity are often used together, and in an industrial sense one depends on the other. Philip Snowden has said: “More cannot lie taken out of industry than is produced. Good wages cannot he paid out of an unprofitable industry. The, more prosperous industry is the better are the chances of labour getting

higher wages.” This is quite obvious and sensible and is a direct negation of the view that any wage-fixing tribunal can fix wages irrespective of the conditions of the industry in which the wage earner is employed. Therefore the Court could not working on its present basis of a “ cost of living ” formula for arriving at a wage standard expect to promote industrial peace, or avoid doing that injury to industry which is

only too obvious just now, and is th< cause of investors declining to sub scribe capital for industrial ventures. There are further obstacles to in dustrial peace, however, to which I wit refer later on, as the question is, you’ readers will admit, of vital important just now if confidence is to he re-estah lished, industrial prosperity brough J about, and unemployment cease’ to b< a serious tax on the country.