The Auckland Star: WITH WHICH ARE INCORPORATED The Evening News, Morning News The Echo and The Sun TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 1, 1936. "THE WORKERS" AND THE LAW.

Auckland Star, Volume LXVII, Issue 206, 1 September 1936, Page 6

The Auckland Star: WITH WHICH ARE INCORPORATED The Evening News, Morning News The Echo and The Sun

TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 1, 1936. "THE WORKERS" AND THE LAW.

For the c>iuse that lacks dssirlance, For the wrong that needs resistance, For the future in the distance, And the good that we can do.

New Zealand's first Labour Government was elected to office pledged to carry out a legislative programme of social and industrial reforms, and it has been fulfilling its pledges as fast as could be expected of it. Compliance with the new legislation has for many people been difficult, but for others —for the class commonly but invidiously described as "the workers" it has been easy, because most of the legislation passed to date has been designed to benefit, specifically, "the workers," at the expense of others in the community.

The Industrial Conciliation ancl Arbitration Amendment Act was one of the first passed by the new Parliament. In it the principle of the 40-hour week in industry was written into the laws of the country, and purposely written in such terms as to make clear Parliament's wish and will that very few branches of industry should be allowed exemption from its operation. The onus was thrown upon employers of proving to the satisfaction of the Arbitration Court that the law was impracticable in specific eases. The Court has heard a large number of applications for exemption; and it has granted some because the proof demanded by the Act has been given. It has carried out the will of Parliament. In some branches of industry which were granted exemption the workers were disappointed. Their disappointment was natural, but in some cases, to the astonished regret of all observers, they have vented their disappointment by breaking the very law which was passed to benefit them. The gravity of such actions, and the dangerous attitude of which the actions are the symptom, can hardly be exaggerated, and wise and timely reference is made to it by the Prime Minister in the statement published to-day.

"A general reduction of working hours to 40 a week," said the Prime Minister, "would be manifestly unfair." He counselled the disappointed workers to be patient, and pointed out that if the Government attempted to put all its plans into force "by a stroke of the.pen" it might cause widespread disruption in industry, from which disruption the workers themselves would be the worst sufferers. He went further, and said that any attempt by the Government to dictate to the Arbitration Court, which had given judgment in specific cases in the light of the evidence before it, would be "absurd." He might have used a stronger word. What could be more dangerous to the whole arbitration system than that one party, while demanding full observance of those parts of the Act which satisfy it, should treat adverse decisions with contempt, and seek to have tham altered, either by direct action or by appealing for political interference? The workers' Government has re-written the industrial laws', professedly in the interests of the whole community, but undoubtedly in the interests of the workers. The workers should be the last to challenge, by unconstitutional and illegal means, the operation of those laws.