"IMPROVE, NOT ABOLISH"

Auckland Star, Volume LIX, Issue 76, 30 March 1928, Page 5

"IMPROVE, NOT ABOLISH"

ARBITRATION COURT. | ! ECONOMIST'S ADVICE. ALTERNATIVES FAVOURED. (By Telegraph—Own Correspondent.) WELLINGTON, this day. "It seems to me better to try oat alternativ. with the Arbitration Court still in being rather than to abolish the Court and replace it by methods which may prove a failure or rather than wait for 'something to turn up" to replace it," said Professor H. Bel aha w, at the conclusion of a paper which he read to the National Industrial Conference.

The professor made the following suggestions:—

"(1) The desirability of fixing a minimum wage varying with the cost of living, but related to family responsibilities by a system of family endowment, should be affirmed in principle. "(2) The possibility of fixing a standard wage above this minimum, on the principle of 'capacity to pay,' should be examined.

"(3) The desirability of fixing the wage rate, whether standard or minimum, at more frequent intervals than at present should be discussed by the conference.

"(4) In view of varial tcs in conditions from locality to locality and from industry to industry, and of Bpedal circumstance- squiring special treatment, it is desirable to investigate the practicability of making provision for special conditions, having due regard for the necessary safeguards against exploitation of groups weak in bargaining power. "(5) It seems to me desirable that alternative methods of collective bargaining should be provided where the majority of workers and < mployers in a district desire it. Trade boards along the lines of those developed in the Lnited Kingdom should be set up as an alternative to compulsory arbitration. The desirability of setting " minimum wage boards in agriculture should be considered.

"(6) In reference to the personnel of the Court, I feel that muc- good would follow from the appoir. .. of a highlyqualified eeonom'-t as research officer to keep the Court familiar with events abroad, and conduct investigations into special problems

"(7) Where third parties are intimately concerned in any aw-rd—as, for example, farmers in a dispute affecting an industry producing farming products, they should be given ev, j facility to present evidence as to how a given award is likely ; affect them. "(8) Setting up of a National District Council which should be an advisory body—probably also similar district councils."

COMPULSION OPPOSED. SHEEPOWNERS' POLICY. WELLINGTON, Thursday. A system of voluntary arbitration for the compulsory clauses of the present Act was suggested in papers delivered before the Industrial Conference to-day by Mr. D. Acland, president of the New Zealand Farmers and Sheepowners* Federation. "I wish to stress the fact that my lederation is not now, nor ever has been, opposed to arbitration in cases of industrial or any other dispute," said Mr. Acland, "but we have steadfastly refused to admit the soundness of the underlying principle of the present Act, which provides for the compulsory fixation of conditions in industry and costs of production by a tribunal clothed with statutory authority, and under which in actual practice complusion can be enforced on one party. "The unfortur»+» results of the application of this unsound principle have been increasingly apparent to us over a long period of years, and the emulative effect of compulsory fixation of production costs, irrespective of the selling value of the product of the labour, is to throw out of balance our whole economic system."

No one was better able to handle questions affecting the interests of any particular trade or industry than those directly engaged in it, said Mr. Acland. r»o tribunal could lay down a definite wage or cost in any industry to cover periods of three years without risks of doing injustice to either one or the other party.