Evening post. MONDAY, MAY 25, 1908. ARBITRATION HISTORICALLY.

Evening Post, Volume LXXV, Issue 123, 25 May 1908, Page 6

Evening post. MONDAY, MAY 25, 1908. ARBITRATION HISTORICALLY.

We are entitled to expect and do expect from the Attorney-General an enlarged view of the principles underlying tho Industrial Conciliation and Arbitration Acts, and an intelligent treatment of the questions at issue in regard to those Acts. By the address which the Attorney-General delivered at .Wanganui on Friday evening that expectation is not altogether disappointed. If we demur to his presentation of facts, and if we differ concerning the remedies that he would apply to existing discontent, it is with a full admission of the capacity of mind and ingenuity of argument that he has brought to the discussion. The Attorney-General avowed his conviction that the general plan of the Actß is sound, and that the effect of their administration has been on the whole fortunate. We would make a similar avowal, although possibly not upon the same grounds or to the same extent. The At* torney-General's exposition of legislative history, for example, is in our view misleading. "The driving force that brought these Acts into law," he is reported as saying, "was only partly a desire to settle industrial war. It was earlier a public opinion shocked by the revelations of sweating, not only in New Zealand, but in Australia." This quotation suggests the tenor of the passage in the Attorney-General's address, devoted to combating the idea that the Act of 1894 "intended originally and solely to prevent strikes." But certainly the Act intended originally -to prevent strikes ; and, as far as the evidence pf, (ho A«fc Usqll goPB, and tha nvlduaro of J&9. £«ji&siflfli«ixjar^&let et.ika. Afik

it was chiefly, and not merely "partly," the result of a. desire "to settle industrial war." The Act was not a law against "sweating." It was entitled "An Act to encourage the formation of industrial unions and associations'' — with the stated object of creating machinery with which it could work — "and to facilitate the settlement of Industrial Disputes by Conciliation and Arbitration." By the Amending Act of 1898, tho words "to encourage tho formation of industrial unions and associations" were omitted ; and the Act professed merely "to facilitate the settlement of Industrial Disputes by Conciliation and Arbitration." The point is important because th« Attorney-General, stating- it inaccurately, is ena-bled to Teach th© conclusion, oa reported, that "The main scheme of the Act was to fix a minimum wage." This appears to us an absolute mis-state-ment, which the Act itself derides. The main scheme of the Act, as it declares and proves in so many sections, was to settle industrial disputes. Reference to the speech of the Hon. W. P. Beeves, when moving th© second reading, shows this clearly. He remarked upon the experimental character of his Bill, and said : "I think that the time is opportune for the- experiment, for undoubtedly publio opinion is growing up, even, among those who might have at one time thought that they had most to gain by strikes, that strikes are at best injurious to all parties, and that conciliation is what must be looked to." This and other passages of the speech make it evident that the Act originated In Mr. Reevea's effort t& find, a legislative expedient for ending industrial disputes. That was "fche main scheme of the Act." It was welcomed by labour unions because its provisions offered incidentally an opportunity of regaining the indusitrial foothold which they hadi lost by the strikes of 1890. Since it proposed to end industrial disputes, and industrial disputes occur regarding wages and conditions of labour, the authorities constituted by the Act were empowered to deal with wages and conditions of labour. Since that dealing would presumably be fair dealing, tEere certainly existed a belief or a hope that the Act would abolish "sweating" by establishing fair wages and conditions of labour. But it must not be forgotten that the Sweating Commission, of 1890, by sis roioes to three, reported "with satisfaction" "that the system known in London and elsewhere as 'sweating,' and which seemed; at one. time likely to obtain, a footing in some of our cities, does not exist." The minority thought that sweating existed', "although only to a very limited extent." We have been at some pains to show that the Attor-ney-General's historical summary is erroneous, and that the effect of his error is to wrest the Arbitration: and Conciliation Acts from their true purport. -The first Act was originally andi chiefly intended to settle industrial disputes and prevent strikes; and if the Act bo decided to have failed! in this object it has failed in its main object, whatever its incidental success otherwise.