UNION DISPUTES HELD UP

Press, Volume LXXIII, Issue 22197, 14 September 1937, Page 10

UNION DISPUTES HELD UP

DELAY THROUGH LEGAL TECHNICALITY REHEARING BY CONCILIATION COUNCILS (PBES3 ASSOCIATION TELEGRAM.) AUCKLAND. September 13. The resubmission of a large number of Au-kland industrial disputes to Conciliation Councils after the Arbitration CourL's pronouncement on the standard rates of wages, is temporarily held up by a legal technicality which the trade unions concerned are trying to remove. At present about 50 Auckland disputes stand referred to the Court, and although there is a reasonable prospect of settling some 20 of them now that the Court's views on wages are known, it has been discovered that tf.c Industrial Conciliation and Arbitre.t en Act makes no provision for the state of auairs that has arisen. Tiie act has apparently never contcmplr.tcd that once a conciliation council has made its formal recommendation to the Court there wi 1 be any occasion to reicr the dispute buck for further negotiation" bctw. en the parties. It is possible that thif procedure is not barred by the act, Lut there is no authority fcr it or for laying the usual fees to the assessors at the resumed sittings. A meeting of agents concerned in a number of the disputes was held today, and considered a report from the secretary of the Auckland District Council of the Federation of Labour (Mr H. CampbelD, regarding the disputes on the tentative list of fixtures drawn up by the Conciliation Commissioner, Mr R. E. Price. Mr Campbell stated that the commissioner had listed only those disputes in which the principal outstanding question was wages and in which there was now a reasonable prospect of complete settlement. The agents present agreed that an endeavour should be made to resume conciliation in these cases. It was further decided to communicate with the Acting-Minister for Labour (the Hon. P. C. Webb) and to ask that authority be given to reconvene a conciliation council, with the payment of assessors' fees. To avoid delay in dealing with the accumulation of disputes, it was resolved to ask the Minister to appoint additional conciliation commissioners.