THE Wairarapa Age MORNING DAILY. FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 14, 1908. ADMINISTRATION OF LABOUR LAWS.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXXI, Issue 9055, 14 February 1908, Page 4

THE Wairarapa Age MORNING DAILY. FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 14, 1908. ADMINISTRATION OF LABOUR LAWS.

The administration of the Arbitration Act has formed the subject of much hostile comment on the part of influential sections of the Press, and condemnation on the part of some employers ever since the slaughtermen's strikes lsst year, and the feeling is gaining ground that the various Unions are under the belief that they may, whenever they desire, ignore the Act with impunity, trusting to Government intervention to save them from serious consequences. This feeling had its origin in the lenient treatment shown to the slaughtermen who defied the law, and the certainty that employers would be very differI ently treated under similar circum- ! stances. It was strengthened later on when Ministers intervened in the West Coast mining dispute. The impression is that the Act is not ad- ' ministered as impartially as it might be, and that there is danger of labour troubles in consequence. These two i examples of the more or less successful defiance of the Act, it is averred, is having an unsettling effect upon employers and workers alike. At the annual meeting of the Southland Frozen Meat Company last week, the chairman in referring to the slaughtermen's strike declared that the labour laws which had been made to prevent trade wars were a great success in imposing and exacting fines from I he unfortunate employer, but were a failure when the fines had to be imposed on the employee, because it was found to- be an unpopular political move. The Denniston episode also showed the willingness of the Government to compound with a breach of the law. The speaker believed that the Arbitration Act was doomed. This is perhaps taking too strong a view of

the position; but it is certain that in the case of the slaughtermen the treatment of the men would contrast unfavourably with the treatment that would have been meted out to the employers had they been the offenders; and that in the Denniston mining trouble the Government wrested the law to its authority and to do a little right did a great wrong, especially in weakening the prestige of the legal tribunal set up to deal with such matters. If the Government values the Arbitration Act as much as it has so frequently declared it does, Ministers should take care to be more circumspect in future. No law is likely to be long respected if the authority of the judicial body set up to administer it is overridden by political intervention.