ARBITRATION COURT.

Press, Volume LXIII, Issue 18970, 7 April 1927, Page 8

ARBITRATION COURT.

CRITICISM FROM MBTHVEN. "If the position were not so serious, we would consider the Arbitration Court a huge joke." This statement was made by Mr J. R. Dalton, president of the Methven branch of the Farmers' Union, yesterday in the course of welcoming the Minister for Agriculture, the Hon. Mr Hawken, who visited Methven during his tour of inspection of the wheat-growing areas of Mid-Canterbury: He never had heard anything condemned so much recently as the Arbitration Court, said Mr Dalton. He was not condemning Mr Justice Fraser but the system. When making increases in awards, the Court should take into account the economic effect it was going to have on the industry concerned. They thought that the Act should be amended in this direction. The preference to unionists clause militated against the farming community. It had limited the output to a great extent. They were told to keep up the spirit of the old pioneers, but how could they under such adverse conditions? He also instanced the increase in threshing costs. The Court did not seem to consider what a fair day's work for a man should be.