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a dispute to the Conciliation Board. The suggestion I have to make is that there should be some provision for fining members who will not attend these meetings ; that the responsibility should to a certain extent be cast on the individual members of the union. 7. That is a matter you could have embodied in your union rules, could you not?— Yes; I suppose so. 8. A suggestion has been made that the vote should be taken by ballot, and not by a majority of the members present at the meeting of the union. Would you favour that ? —The only difficulty would be that it would involve a very large amount of work in order to take a ballot on each clause. 9. But the ballot would be taken on the general question to refer the case to the Board ; the question would be submitted to the meeting, and then the ballot taken.—l should agree with it if a ballot was taken on the general question. 10. Is that all the evidence you desire to give ?—Yes. 11. Mr. Arnold.'] With regard to the Government employes getting fair and proper consideration, you stated, Mr. McLaren, that the only thing they could do was to have a strike, or something of that kind, did you not ?—Yes. 12. I suppose that under the present Act they could strike?—l do not know of anything to prevent them. 13. With regard to other trades—l mean under the present Arbitration and Conciliation Act, after an award has been filed —is there anything to prevent them from striking ?—I see nothing to prevent any union from striking. 14. Is there not a clause in the present Act which distinctly says that there shall be no strike or lock-out when an industrial dispute has been filed ? —Yes, I believe so, when an industrial dispute has been filed. 15. Do you think that a clause of that kind is wise—that there should be something to prevent strikes and locks-out ?—Yes, I think it is a wise thing. 16. Old clause 29 is omitted in the present Act; do you think that it should be re-inserted ? —Yes; I certainly think it should be. I think that one of the principal objects of this Act is to prevent strikes, and therefore I think that the clause should be re-inserted, that no strikes should take place. 17. Mr. Hutcheson.] I would like to draw your attention to subclause (4) of clause 104, which says : "If any industrial dispute arises between the Minister and the society it may be referred to the Court for settlement if the Minister so agrees." Has your union considered that subclause in the section ?—No; my union has not considered it to any extent. 18. Do I understand you to say that generally you want the whole of the Government Departments brought under the operation of the Act ? —Yes. 19. Has your union any representations to make, any suggestions to offer, concerning the representation of the Conciliation Board ? —No; my union has no representations to make. Speaking as a member of the Trades Council, that matter has been discussed. A considerable number of the members of the Trades Council think that an alteration should be made in the direction of appointing assessors to sit with the Board during the whole course of the proceedings. 20. The Chairman.} Is that included in the recommendations of the Trades Councils ? —Yes. One of the suggestions that came up was that the Board should consist of three prominent members and the Chairman, and that the parties to the dispute should each appoint one assessor. 21. Mr. Tanner.] Do you gather from reading sections 34, 8, and 11, that the tendency of the Act will be to create too many trade-unions ? —Yes. 22. To multiply the unions ? —Yes. 23. To raise branches of unions to the dignity of unions when they are only branches ?—Yes; we would gather that the effect would be to give branches of unions the same status as an industrial union, and thereby cause considerable friction and confusion. 24. You think it would tend to a great deal of division in . the Councils of the unions themselves? —Yes, and there is another danger —it would be a continual harassment to the employers if there were two or more unions representing the same industry in the same particular locality. 25. You think that the two other clauses would tend to nullify clause 11 ?—Yes, to a certain extent. 26. Would it not also largely increase the expense of managing unions ? —-Yes, it would be an increased expense in managing unions ; but it is not the matter of the expense that we consider— it is the matter of creating friction among the unions and also the harassment of the employers. 27. You think it would lead to unnecessary complications?— Yes, undoubtedly. 28. The Chairman.] On the question of a Board of experts—do you think that if the present Conciliation Boards were " wiped" out, and you had men who had practically no interest in the dispute at all to deal with the matter without any personal feeling, do you not think you would be more likely to come to conciliation than if you had two men deeply interested in the trade to fight the matter out ? My experience has been that when there is an expert on each side, each one will fight for his own side ?—My personal opinion of the matter is that it would be a good thing to have a mixed Board ; that there should be two members of the Board appointed for, say, a period of three years, and that the parties to the dispute should each appoint one member, and thus get the advantage of expert knowledge. 29. Would you allow them to go in Committee with the Board and exercise a vote?— Yes. 30. Mr. Ell.] Do not you think that the expert knowledge could be gathered from the evidence ?—No, Ido not think so. When the Wharf Labourers' Union was before the Board we spent the best part of a day explaining certain meanings to members of the Board. If there had been one or more men on the Board who understood the various technicalities we would not have had to spend more than half an hour in this way.