COURT DECLINES JURISDICTION

Press, Volume XCVIII, Issue 28889, 8 May 1959, Page 5

COURT DECLINES JURISDICTION

Amendment Sought To Main Rules

The Court of Arbitration has decided that it has no jurisdiction to consider an appeal from the Canterbury Amalgamated Shop Assistants’ and Related Trades Union for an amendment to its rules. The registrar of industrial unions refused to record the amendment sought and the union appealed to the Court for a direction to the registrar. The effect of the proposed amendment, said the union secretary (Mr P. M. Velvin) yesterday, would have been to legalise the coverage under the award which the union had already been giving without authority. The application was made under section 70, sub-section 2 of the Industrial Conciliation and Arbitration Act. 1954. It was submitted, for the registrar, that he refused to record the amendment not because the existing rule was “in any way unreasonable or oppressive,’’ but because it was contrary to law. “This submission.” said the Court, in its decision 3 released yesterday, ‘‘was fully supported and confirmed by evidence.” After tracing the history of the relevant legislation back to the 1908 Act. the Court decided that the desired amendment fell within the ambit of section 58 (2) of the 1954 Act. and that it was not lawful for the rules to be amended except with the concurrence of the Minister of Labour. “We cannot conceive that the Legislature intended the Court to have jurisdiction to entertain an appeal of the nature now before us.” said the Court. “If the Court considered the appeal and allowed it. the matter would not necessarily be determined. and the amendment would not be lawful without ministerial concurrence which could be withheld. “In such circumstances the decisions of the Court and the Minister could not stand together, and an order of the Court directing the Registrar would, we think, be inconsistent with the provisions of the Act.”