AUSTRALIAN ARBITRATION LAWS.

Evening Post, Issue 73, 23 September 1903, Page 2

AUSTRALIAN ARBITRATION LAWS.

m INTERVIEW WITH MR. SAMUEL BROWN. [BY TEIiECJBAPH — OWN CORRESPONDENT. J AUCKLAND, This Day. I ' interviewed Mr. Samuel Brown this morning, and found him much refreshed in health by his holiday, and ready for work, which he proposes to resume at Welljngton at the end of the week. Mr. Brown courteously answered some questions concerning the Australian Arbitration laws, and from his replies it seems evident that they are not likely to prove a success. "My view, from what I have seen," said he, "leads me to have grave doubts of their ever making a success of it in the present circumstances. It is such a big place, and the conditions are different from ours. New South Wales has practically the same Act as our own,and 1 have reason to believe that their Courts use our judgments in formulating their own. This is a mistake, because, as I have said, the conditions are quite different. Then their decisions are not within the same bounds of moderation as ours. "I had before me the case of a colliery which had been compelled to shut down because under the award it did not pay the owners to continue. The Court ordered the mine to be re-opened, and further directed that a certain quantity of c6al must be put out by the mine. Now, un,der our Act that could not be done, and I believe that it was ultra vires, even in New South Wales. "The country has gone in for too much. Tb tell the truth, it has attempted to regulate every trade in the State, and I think it would have done better to have followed the example of New Zealand and built up the law little by little. There is enough work for one Court for 'two years already on hand, and to liave more than one Court means confusion. The secret of the success of the New Zealand Act has been that it began in a small way, and, more than that, because of the great tact and judgment with which it was administered. This does not seem to have been the case in New South Wales. Business men complain that they are being badly harassed by the Act, and one prominent New Zealand business man in Sydney told me he had come to the conclusion tliat the New Zealand Act was much better worked than the New South Wales Act." * "But how do the working people view the working of the Act?-" I asked. "Well,' replied Mr. BroAvn, "I was not able to see for myself there, but they have not had any decisions to affect them in a (serious degree. I think, however, from what I was told that the unions have got restrictions put upon business which will be detrimental to the interests of the working people in the long run." Mr. Brown leaves Auckland on Thursday, accompanied by Mrs. Browu.