UNION S.S. COMPANY.

Auckland Star, Volume XXX, Issue 160, 8 July 1899, Page 5

UNION S.S. COMPANY.

INTERVIEW WITH MR JAMES

MILLS.

AN OPINION ON THE ARBITRA-

TION ACT

Mr James Mills, managing director of the Uuiou Steamship Company, during a conversation witli a Sydney

"Daily Telegraph" representative, made reference to several new steamers which are about to pass into the possession of the company, and to some impending arrangements that are to be made with respect to the company's trade. "We are going," Mr Mills said, "to fill the place of the Te Kapo, which was recently wrecked in the Sydnej'-Launceston trade, with the Wakatipu, pending the building of a new steamer. There is being constructed a new steamer, called the Kittawa, which is a Tasmanian native Dame, to take up the Koonya's running in the Tasmanian west coast trade, and we have just purchased tho North Lyell, a good steamer, with special passenger accommodation, for the Melbourne - Macquarie Harbour trade. This vessel'was brought out to Melbourne by Captain Anderson, late of the-K.M.S. Austral.

"As to the American trade, we expect to have our new steamers, which are to replace the Alameda and the' Mariposa, ready for the passenger season of next April. These boats will be capable of steaming 17 knots, although their average speed will be something like 15 knots. That, of course, will be an improvement upon the present service, and the new boats will be fitted after the elaborate and comfortable fashion of the Atlantic liners. They will be 6000-ton boats, and really quite equal to the best Atlantic steamers. And, generally speaking, as the occasion arises for the company to buy or build other vessels, the aim is to make the new boats represent an advance upon the old, both in respect of speed, accommodation and general comfort."

Recently a claim was made against the Union Steamship Company under the New Zealand Arbitration and Conciliation Act. This Act provides in cases of industrial dispute for the matter to be referred to the Conciliation Board, and an appeal lies to the Arbitration Court. Mr Mills was asked what the questions in dispute w7ere, and, in viewr of the settlement of disputes in this way being more or less experimental legislation, whether he had formed an opinion as to the value of the Conciliation and Arbitration Act.

"A claim,"- Mr Mills answered, "was made upon us by seamen and firemen for an advance in wages and overtime, certain restrictions on the hours of labour, and a demand that preference as to employment should be given to union men. This, of course, meant an increased expenditure to the company. The whole matter was fully gone into, the sittings of the Board occupyingfive or six days. The Board rejected the claim for increased wages and overtime, but upheld the demand as to union men. The position now is that our company have given notice of appeal to the Arbitration Court. As to my opinion about the Act, I think that this method of settling disputes is, on the whole, satisfactory. Under the operations of this Act the parties can meet together, and after a little discussion the strength of each case can be pretty well judged. In the old mode parties could not propei'ly understand each other, the result being that the differences between, them multiplied, and any settlement was difficult to come at."

"Are counsel entitled to appear?" "Only by consent. And I think it i_ better not to have counsel employed in these disputes. In no case up to the present have they been retained. The proceedings may be a little diffuse on that account, but, all the same, I am inclined to think that they are, on the whole, simpler for both parties."

"Are employers generally in favour of the principle of the Bill?"

"Yes; I think, generally speaking, they are. Of course, it does happen that some employers fancy the Bill gives the greater chance to the men. Where many employers have lost, it has, I think, been owing to their having gone to the Board or the Court unprepared. But any feeling of^onesidedness against the Bill will,l think, die out in time, and the machinery of the Act will be generally accepted as a fair and expeditious means of arriving at a settlement in industrial disputes."