WORK AND WAGES.

Stratford Evening Post, Volume XXXIV, Issue 93, 14 December 1912, Page 5

WORK AND WAGES.

ARBITRATION COURT AWARD UPSET. (By Electric Telegraph.—Copyright.) (United Press Association.) Sydney, December 13. The High Court delivered judgment on tiie shipping companies’ application for a prohibition against the President of the Arbitration Court and the Merchant Service Guild enforcing an award, fixing the wages and conditions of members of the Guild. The main objection to the award w;is that with regard to some of the firms affected no dispute existed beyond the limits of one State. The Chief Justice, in the course of his judgment, laid down that a dispute must be actually existing and actually extending beyond one State before Federal powers were exercisable, and mere mischief makers could not, by the expenditure of a few shillings on paper, ink and stamps create such an occasion. He held that the time of the notice given by the Guild to shipowners to enter into an industrial agreement or convene a conference was absurdly inadequate. Such a notice could only be regarded as an ultimatum, and the suggested conference was illusory. There must bo a real opportunity to discuss an industrial claim before it could develop into an industrial dispute, and proper time must be given. r J he present case was not an evidence of unadjusted differences between the applicants and their employees. In the light of the date of the notice he considered that the objections raised wore good. Mr. Justice Barton concurred. Mr. Justice Higgins dissented. An order for prohibition was granted, thus upsetting the Arbitration Court’s award.