ARBITRATION SYSTEMS

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume LXIII, 20 July 1929, Page 9

ARBITRATION SYSTEMS

BIG AUSTRALIAN COSTS TEN MILLIONS A YEAR SPEECH BY Mil BRUCE 'ln a speech to members of the Sydney Chamber of Manufacturers recently, the Prime Minister 01 Australia, Mr Bruce, referred to the Government’s decision to rotiro from arbitration. He said the present duplication of arbitration systems was costing industry more than the whole of the Federal income tax, amounting to £10,000,000 annually. “The Government’s policy,” said Mr Bruce, ‘Rvill clear the decks in regard to the whole industrial position in Australia, because, once the Federal authority is out of the way it will be open to every method to ,, be adopted to try and handle the problems of industry.”

Mr Bruce said that to-day they were confronted with considerable difficulties. Jt was essential that the cost of production should be reduced so that the exporting industries would be strengthened in their competition, overseas, and the secondary industries also strengthened. The Government had reached the decision that nothing was contributing to the high cost of production more than the duplication of industrial regulations and the complexities with which every employer was faced. It had been suggested that the Government was attacking the principles and ideals of compulsory arbitration and the peaceful settlement pf industrial disputes. “We are not attacking anything of the sort,” said the Prime Minister. “We are only attacking the duplication that exists. I believ# in the Commonwealth having the control of arbitration. I am one of the disciples of the principle of Commonwealth arbitration, and I have been all along.

DEFECTS OF PRESENT SYSTEM

“You are not faced with the position whether you can achieve all you desire by letting the Commonwealth stay in the. field, because the Commonwealth’s powers are limited to arbitration and conciliation, except with regard to mter-State disputes. The result is that the conciliation power is practically useless, and the arbitration power can only function as between the people who are actually parties to the dispute. Whatever authority is going to control industrial regulation, that party, must have power to deal with it in whatever way.is best to suit the circumstances of individual industries.

“It is intolerable to go on with the present position of duplication, because so many defects have been revealed in it. One thing it lias contributed to has been the hideous uncertainty in regard to industrial matters. We are not attacking the principle of wage regulation or the principle of endeavouring to carry out the great ideals for the peaceful settlement of the industrial disputes. Mr Bruce said that the employee must be safeguarded from exploitation. No one would desire to see a return to the conditions which prevailed in the ’nineties.

MANIFESTO BY WORKERS’ UNION

In a statement issued hv Senator J. n -vnoq and A T - 17 -w AT L.O •resident and gereral secretary rerectively of the Australian Workers’ Union, the opinion was expressed that •n retiring from the industrial field the Federal Government was flirting with disaster. As apparently State arbitration was to go as well as the Federal ’ system—as the big interests were insisting on this—the people would be at the mercy of the direct actionists on both sides. Strikes and I lockouts would be inevitable. J As the Australian Workers’ Union, | says the statement, believed that‘Mr Bruce’s policy was part of a general move bv employers to break up the Federal'unions, which were truly Australian in character and sentiment, the - executive council of the union had called on its members in every State to oppose what was considered to be really an iniquitous attempt to rob the workers of ’all that had been gained through years of bitter fight’ng. By its contemplated act. of betrayal the Government would violate the whole spirit of the Constitution. “Mr Bruce has no mandate from the people for his proposed action, but pretends that he will meet the situation by asking for greater powers for the Federal Parliament at the next election,” says the statement. “It lias to he remembered, however, that when Mr Bruce previously asked for these powers, through the last industrial referendum, his proposals contained provisions for the delegation of unpreced-, entecl powers to a judicial dictatorship, I appointed for life, and therefore, out of reach of both people and Parliament.