LABOUR CONFERENCE

Dominion, Volume 18, Issue 90, 11 January 1924, Page 8

LABOUR CONFERENCE

DISSATISFACTION WITH ARBITRATION COURT. The conference of affiliated and unaffiliated organisations with the New Zealand Alliance of Labour was continued yesterday. Consideration was given to the proposal to establish a labour information and research bureau. It was decided that thb Alliance of Labour cooperate with the New Zealand Labour Party in the establishment of _ the bureau; that the bureau he jointly owned and controlled by the Alliance of Labour and Labour Party ; and that representation on the committee of the bureau should be on the basis of five for each bureau. It was decided that a committee of five lie set up from the alliance and the Labour Party to deal with the last resolution and also with two other questions submitted. Criticism of Arbitration CourtAfter some discussion, the following motion was carried: —“That this conference of labour organisations representing 61,000 workers, most emphatically protests against the refusal of the Arbitration Court to afford representatives of the workers an opportunity of stating their case in favour of an increase in wages before it wade its recent determination that there should be no alteration in the basic wage, such refusal being in total opposition to the letter and spirit of tho Conciliation and Arbitration Amendment Act of 1921-22, which specifically provides that an opportunity of being heard shall be afforded to representatives of both employers and workers before any determination is made by the Court; for the reason that the Court refused the workers an opportunity of stating their case, for an increase m wages, although it had afforded the employers every opportunity of prosecuting their case in favour < f a reduction in wages.” The. conference condemned the membership of the Court as at present constituted, and declared that the Court had forfeited anv claim to the confidence of the workers.