Evening Post.

Evening Post, Volume LXXV, Issue 23, 28 January 1908, Page 6

Evening Post.

TUESDAY, JANUARY 28, 1908. THE DENNIBTON SETTLEMENT «q» — The Denniston collieries labour difficulty has beon happily settled in a way we had suggested. By the* intervention of the Premier and the Minister for Labour, the- parties have reached a new agreement which the. Arbitration Court will be asked to ratify in an amended award. That intervention, had it been earlier, had been wiser. Its fortunate issue might then, have followed with at little more dignity, and a little less fus-s. And the credit of our chief industrial Court would havo been spared the loss tt> which it has been temporarily subjected. The success of Ministers' interposition does not altogether atone for the delay in interposing. Responsibility for tho delay attaches to the Minister for Labour, as the Minister charged with control of the Industrial Conciliation Acts. Immediately ho was advised of the men's refusal to obey the Court, and of the singular situation that aroso through the masters' acceptance of the refusal, he should have bestirred himself .to uphold the Court's authority. Three courses were open to- him. He could have instructed his officers to take steps to enforce the award or secure the penalties provided for breach. He could, through the InI spector of Awards, have moved the Court to revise its award upon fresh evidence given. Or he could have followed the | course tardily adopted, and either personally or with a&sistauce have endeavoured to bring the parties to an agreement for the Court's ratification. But clearly he should have decided and have acted at once. By his delay he has brought the Court into contempt. Day after day, since the first week in December, the award has been broken, and until the third week iii January the v Minister permitted it to be broken, and made no oveit sign of disapproval. We trust that this strange laxity of administration will not recur. We have stated three courses that were open to the Minister. The fit&t com so, the enforcement of the award, meant industrial war; and the object of the Industrial Conciliation Acts is industrial peace. It was a. course Hot to be followed in the Denniston case ; for by » series of steps which were perfectly justifiable the Arbitration Court had been placed in a false position. Its award conformed with the law, and probably conformed with, what was expedient in a general view of the case; but it did not agree with the general intention of the law, it tidd not agree with the general custom, of the industry, and the men might therefore contend fairly that it did not aeree with natural justice. It is questionable whether the reduction of the colliers' working day to a net period of less than aeven hours is not against the/ interest of trado and the community; but that question is answered by the practice of the neighbouring Granity mine, working three shifts daily. If it were not so answered, there is still insufficient reason for making Denniston an exception to tho New Zealand rule. So that it had become necessary for tho Court to retrace its steps, and to accept a- solution of tho dispute which the parties had. already found for it. The second course meant delay and possible difficulty. The straightforward course was the course that in°tho end has been followed. By. this course tho authority of the Arbitration Court is not impugned ; for it is a course provided by the Industrial Acts. The Ministerial conciliators have merely induced the parties to apply existing law. The masters had already conceded practically tho principle of eight hours from bank to bank. AU that remained was to secure a precise agreement legarding tho time occupied in walking to and from work. The- agreement reached is in line with a previous offer by the 1 masters. Tho walking-time in one section of the mine is fixed at 48 minutes ; in the other at o2 minutes. This means that the men are in the mine for eight hours daily, including v these periods of time, and including half-an-hour meal-time. The actual working-time is thus 6hr 42min. in one section, and 6hr 58min in the other ; and the, masters can arrange surface work definitely to correspond.. Payment of course is on piece, according to the coal hewed by e^h man. Apparently tho men had hitherto resisted this precise allotment of walking-time on account of jealousy as to the respective earnings of the man who walks only a short distance to his hewing place and the man who walks a long distance. It is desirable to add a few words upon aspects of the quarrel that appear to ha.ye been misunderstood. There was never any conflict between the existing* Denniston award and the Coal-Mines Amendment Act, 1907. There was never any conflict between Parliament and the Arbitration Court. This is sufficiently plain to anyone who will take the trouble to compare tho text of .the Act with the text of the award. It is affirmed by the v Court's own decision in Decomber. Tho natural hesitation of Parliament to interfere with the discretion of tho Court has in fact had its share in creating the Denniston difficulty. The Arbitration Court has had, and has still, a perfectly free hand in the matter. But the constitution and object of the Court seem occasionally to be lost sight of. Although clothed with judicial authority, it is, as its name declares, a Court of Arbitration. As its controlling Act of Parliament implies, it is a Court of Industrial Conciliation. It does not exist to declare fixed law regardless of consequences. It exists under a liny which empowers it, within veTy wide limits, to enact its own law, to vary its own law, and constantly to apply that law to the changing necessities of any particular case. Its decisions are not final, and it is the essence and virtue of its constitution that they are not final. The end of its existence is reached, not when it has given a decision, • but when industry is content and progressive as -the result of its decision. If industry remains discontented and unprogressive, this shows, not neces&arily that the decision should be enforced, but possibly that the decision should be altered. The value of the Supreme Court is in its statement of the. law. The value of the Arbitration Court is in the results which follow its statement of its own law. _ Parliament of course is paramount ; and in .the recent words of tho Arbitration Court retains "its privilege of legislating with regard to all or any of the matters that may bo dealt with in ail award of the Court." Naturally Parliament, having delegated so much of its authority, will interfere with its delegato as littlo as passible In the Denniston case it has interfered with, the Court as littlo as possible, having regard to the general opinion in favour of limiting the labour day to eight hours. Despite the men's misapprehension, it is more than four years since Parliament passed any legislation that could affect the Arbitration Court's award in that case, and even then its legislation tended to increase the latitude allowed to tho Court. The deadlock was really a tragedy of good intentions on all sides. Its ending without straining the law or invnlidniting tfie Arbitration Court is a nutter of general cougraUi la limy