INDUSTRIAL CONFLICT

Hokitika Guardian, 10 September 1929, Page 7

INDUSTRIAL CONFLICT

By X. When last writing on this matter 1 stated ihere were obstacles to industrial peace to which I. would refer later on. I have already shown that the Arbitration and Conciliation system has led not to industrial peace but (as admitted by the Labour delegation at the Industrial Conference) to a condition of suppressed war. Almost every day since I last wrote evidence has been piling up showing how increasingly difficult it is to prevent the stranglehold which coercion and lawlessness is obtaining over industry from paralysing national activities altogether. In Australia prolific disorder and violence had reached such a pitch that the situation became in effect incipient civil war. It was an object lesson as to what may be expected when ally government is futile and helpless when faced with a problem which after all is a simple cne—the maintenance of law and order. The mildness with which the situation was handled simply encouraged the more irresponsible section of the workers to believe there were no lengths to which they may not safely go. The limit has, however, now been reached and one of the first actions of Mr Bavin on his return to Sydney was to announce the Government will no loger tolerate mass picketing or permit any attempt to intimidate or interfere with free labour. Messrs Garden, Kavanagh, and Ryan are also to be tried in due course to discover whether they as official strike lenders bad or bad not anything to do with the “.basher ” gangs and the lawlessness and violence which has been a scandal and a disgrace to civilization.

■ While we can hardly visualize that anything approaching the position in Australia could, or is likely to develop in New Zealand, it is necessary to remember that the same causes are operating. and at any time a crisis may develop which the Government and the people should be prepared to meet. We have an uneconomic wnge rate fixed by the Arbitration Court which ■ the Court is iioav unable to reduce without danger; of an industrial upheaval. We have organised attempts to produce under the guise of Labor Federation a close corporation winch under control of a few labor leaders can paralyse all industry. Then we have attempts, either with the express or tacit sanction of - the unions, to establish “ job control ” or dictatorship as to whom employers may or may not employ and what they may or may not dc*. Then there is the development of " class consciousness ” placing obedience to union officials before loyalty to employers;' and a still more sinister development of individual irresponsibility defying even union control. At the back o ! f all this we have, though perhaps not to the same degree as in the Australia, BolshevikCommunistic propaganda preaching “ war against capitalism,” absorbed by those whose reasoning powers have not been sufficiently developed to realize what this means, or the general chaos and disaster which would follow. Then again there is the most dangerous fallacy that it is no longer the duty o r the individual to make a living for himself, or herself, but to look to the Government to find employment at the full rate of wages, whether economic or not, that the Arbitration Court may have laid down. These various causes are responsible largely for the present unemployment and may lead at any time to bitter and deplorable industrial conflict.

There are always “lines of.least resistance ”* which can be followed to stave off trouble, but unfortunately the trouble only crops up again later in an aggravated form. To take an illustration. The other day, on one of the Union Coy’s colliers a fireman and a cook had a difference of opinion which was settled—or ' should have been settled—in the old-fashioned, way. Anyhow there was a fight, and if my memory serves me the cook had the best of it. In the old days they would have probably shaken hands, bad a wash down and been go"d friends afterwards. Anyhow the incident would have been looked on as quite unimportant bv those who went down to the sea in ships in the days before “ class consciousness was developed and unions and labor federations oignnized. But what was the result? The firemen as a body refused to take the vessel to sea unless the cook was sa Iced. and were apparently backed up in this bv their union officials. The Cooks and Stewards’ Union declared that if the cook was sacked, or if the fireman wasn’t sacked (I don’t know wh ch and it doesn’t make any difference) their men would come ashore. As trouble was brewing either way the Company took the line of least resistance. paid all hands off, and laid the vessel up.

I coukl give dozens of illustrations perhaps not as humorously r-'diculous —where the result has been the same. Harassed employers, struggling to keen going under keen competition and with only a fractional margin as between profit and loss, faced eitliei vvith some further demands from their emplovees, or realising that the lattei were quite indifferent as to vvheth i the industry was paying or not have taken the line of least resistance a fid eif'er cut their losses and closed down, or reduced their turnover and thoii staff. More unemployment, and a howl about lack 'of enterprise on the part of tho employer. But ordinary common sense should make ( it clear that employers cannot carry on showing a loss year by year, W hen organ-

ised labour insists on receiving more than.it can earn then the industry in which this demand is made must close down, it is not a ease of “ lock out ” which is supposed to he equivalent to a “strike” on the part of employers, ft is a case of absolute necessity. When enormously big issues are involved, as in the case of the 1800 cotton mills in England with their half million operatives something is done, and a reduction of wages was promptly agreed to when the actual crisis was reached. But in the smallar and more -isolated cased industries 'have been allowed to die out. The Sling l’oint Colliery for instance went in!o liquidation because the miners wou d not accept a guaranteed, minimum of 18s a day. The northern gum fields are gradually being deserted pnd large areas closed down because the gum diggers are demanding more 'for the gum than it will fetch in the open market and finding it more profitable to join* the umemployed. The gold fields are losing their attraction for the placer miner because lie finds as a casual labourer bis labour is supposed to be worth some 14s a day. The small settler is discontented with his returns which are something only a fraction of what he would be. -claiming if working under an award, and he finds himself unable to employ labour as the return from it would be less than the wages paid. To that generally speaking it may be taken that stagnation, discontent and unemployment follow directly on attempts to establish wages on an uneconomic basis. And it equally follows that industrial conflict may be anticipated when attempts are made to bring matters back to normal—that is to regulate wages according to earning power. There is another line of least resistance which can however he (followed to maintain industrial pea:e, and that is for the Government to abioorb the unemployment and pay uneconomic wages. This can tide over the difficulty for quite a time, until the increase in public debt and increase in taxation brings home to the people the stern reality that they have to foot the bill, and that a loss is a loss whether made by a Government department, a local body, or a private employer. There is a. tendency now for the public to insist on the Government departments standing up to Hie same overhead charges, taxation,.etc. that the private employer has to meet. If this is carried out the result will probably be rather startling and dispose once for all of the contention that the otate can compete economically with private enterprise. In the meantime however the position is that private enterpnse is being crippled. We are importing coal, timber, iron, machinery, and numerous things which could well be produced in the country, but cannot be produced economically under existing conditions. Whether, and hoav these conditions can be changed time alone will show. . Relief cannot be expected from the Arbitration Court and Conciliation Councils are futile except as a means of suppressing incipient industrial conflagrations. Industrial peace we may have but it will be accompanied by industrial stagnation until the whole community awakes to the actual realities and investigates without Tear or favour all the causes which are responsible for unemployment stagnation, and' the appalling increase in private and public indebtedness.