INDUSTRIAL LAW

Evening Post, Volume CIX, Issue 138, 14 June 1930, Page 11

INDUSTRIAL LAW

AUSTRALIAN BILL

SOME DRASTIC CHANGES

OPPOSITION BOUSED

l"ull details of the Government's proposed amendments to the Commonwealth Conciliation and Arbitration Act wore made available when a Bill was introduced into the House of Representatives by tho Attorney-General and read a first'time (says the "Melbourne Age").

The Bill repeals many clauses and provisions of the Act, and doloteo as far as possible, all.major penalties. The penalties for'breaches of awards are, however, retained. , The objects of the Act are altered by substituting the words,. "promoting goodwill,in .industry," in lieu of "preventing lock-outs and strikes." The effect of one important amendment is to. put the, basic wage in the same position as standard hours. ,It provides that, hours, shall not be increased, . nor. the. basic . wage reduced, nor the principle of computing the basic wage altered' except by the three Judges of the Court, in which case the Attorney-General will have the right to ■ intervene. Conciliation Commissioners are given full arbitralpowers in the amending Bill, the only limitation pla ,-d upon them, as compared with the Judge, being the constitutional limitation that a Conciliation Commissioner cannot under the Constitution Act exercise judicial functions. FULL POWEK. "■ A further important amendment purports to give the Judge of the Arbitration Court: full and final power to decide upon the existence of a dispute within the Act and " the: Constitution. This may be queried from the constitutional aspect, but the Ministry is pressing the Act to go as.far as is possible under the constitution. The Section, which requires a Judge to take into consideration the economic effect of an award, is repealed under the amending Bill. It is also made clear that there is to be no legal representation, except by the consent of tlie Court and all the parties. The section requiring security to be given for the performance of awards is repealed, and the same action is taken in respect to the section which gives the' Court power to dismiss or refrain from hearing a dispute on the ground that it is more desirable than it should be dealt witli by a State authority. Regarding it as too arbitrary and inquisitorial and to go much beyond practical needs, the Ministry also proposes the repeal of the section giving the Court wide powers to suspend or cancel an award for a strike or lock-out or non-observance. PREFERENCE TO UNIONISTS. Under section 40 of the Act, the power in the Court.to give preference to unionists is retained, but the words, "other things being equal," are omitted as being meaningless unless intended as an invitation or a hint to the Judge that the principle need not bo applied for any reason which in the ■opinion of the Judge makes for inequality. The power to levy on the property of an organisation, and. where f that is in•srifficient upon the members' of the organisation, will, no longer continue if tho Bill is passed. Nor will the High Court, a county. Court, or any local Court have power to,make an order in the nature, of a mandamus or. injunction to compel compliance with an! award or to restrainfits breach. Section 50 is also repealed. It gives the Court power to cut off all the benefits of an award in cases where there has been a contravention, and to order that the person offending shall cease to be a meiniber of an organisation, and that he shall lose all existing or accruing rights. All the clauses relating to the holding of a' secret ballot will be deleted from the Act if the amendments are agreed to, and similar treatment will bo accorded to the section which opens tho door to members of an organisation entering • into special agreements with employers during the currency of awards, and prevents rules being made to the contrary. Section 60 will be amended by cutting out the sub-sec-tions relating to reasons why registration of an organisation may ho cancelled. Th-eso reasons include strikes, lock-outs, and general matters such as the failure by- an organisation to exercise control over its members or branches, or that it has adopted what is known as "domestic rules," or that it has "systematically" committed offences. A further amendment is to restore a section dropped by the late Government preventing resignations during the. pendency of a dispute. DISCIPLINARY PROVISIONS. Believing it safer to leave disciplinary provisions to be included in' the rules of an organisation itself, the Ministry has taken the step of repealing sections giving the Court power to discipline members. ~lt has not been thought wise in the interests of members of organisations that the audit should be abolished, but the words "competent auditor" has been inserted for "qualified auditor." Other provisions as to the audit aro cut out. _ The section, dealing with prohibitions of boycott and declaring- "black" is repealed,. These provisions are considered too vague and general, and to interfere unduly with the effective organisation of a union in as far as they rolate to such matters as threats, abusive language, or violence. They are considered by the Ministry to be adequately covered by the Police Offences Actsand' Crimes Acts, The same applies to the penalty of £500 provided under section. 86b. .; The protection provided a Judge under section 86c is also deleted. The section imposes a typo of censorship upon public meetings and abxisive or insulting words uttered about a Judge.' The Ministry considers that a Judge is already protected in his Court under other provisions, while the Police. Offences and Crimea Acts also deal with such matters. It is not considered proper to embody such inat'ters in a Conciliation and Arbitration Act. -.;•..'■• .;,,.; . ■ The prosident of the Victorian Chamber of Manufactures, Mr. J. MacDougall, has strongly criticised the Bill. Mr. MacDougall characterises aa "utter camouflage" the statoment by the Federal Government that the promotion of good will in industry by conciliation and arbitration is the main objective in the Bill. The purpose of the measure, in his opinion, is to give trade union officials greater dominance in industry than they now possess;* to make more difficult tho system of arbitration in regard to thf settlement of alleged industrial disputes, and to prevent any consideration being given to the economic conditions of the Commonwealth in fixing wages. ■ The Bill attacks the interests of the- general public so that favours may be enjoyed by a privileged class. An organisation seeking an nwarcl of the Court must be considered in any circumstances, before the interests of the people as a whole. Under tho guise of conciliation, the Ministry proposes that CommissionoL-s shall bo given power to deal with disputes or threatened disputes between parties. All that the Bill does is to enable so-called Conciliation Commision-

ers to bo substituted for the Judges of the Court. The appointments- that it is proposed to make would be those of arbitrators and not of conciliators.

ALL UNIONISTS.

Tho experience of Now South Wales in the appointment of Conciliation Commissioners by the last Labour Government is enlightening. They wero all drawn from trade union officials, and certainly could not be said to possess any particular qualifications for the work they hud to perform. The question arises whether it would not be betlev to retain the arbitration of highly educated men trained in analysing problems, than to risk tho appointment of biased laymen. Certainly some reform in the present procedure is needed, but it should conform more to employers and employees meeting around the tablo with, if needs be, sf Judge as arbitrator.

How unjust arc the proposals of the Government may be judged from the fact that, even though a union went on strike against an award, no power could take tho award away from it. The preference given to the union on strike would prevent any non-union-ist workmen from Toeing employed, notwithstanding that the union was flouting the law. Such a position is farcical in tho extreme. While the unionists are not to be amenable to the law, the employers can be prosecuted for breaches of an award. All tho inquisitorial procedure for the policing of awards by union officials is untouched by tho new Bill. The idea of having deleted from the Act the provisions for a secret ballot among members of a union is undoubtedly designed to compel obedience to the dictation of an official and unreasonable section. It is evident that the Ministry is acceding to the wishes of the trades union dictators in seeking to have the secret ballot clauses wiped out of the Act.