FEDERAL APPEAL

Evening Post, Volume CXXXVII, Issue 129, 2 June 1944, Page 4

FEDERAL APPEAL

MAN-POWER PROBLEM

ARE REGULATIONS VALID? O.C. SYDNEY,. May 30. The decision of the High Court of Australia on the validity of manpower regulations which purport to empower the authorities to direct people to work for private employers is being awaited with great anxiety by the Federal Government. The High Court will hear at the end of this week the Commonwealth's appeal against the finding of the New South Wales Full Court that the regulations are invalid.

Should the appeal be dismissed, the Government will face a big problem. Even' by exercising the powers conferred by the regulations, the New South Wales Man-power Department alone is 27,000 men and women short of requirements for essential industries. In addition, it is feared that many, individuals who have been, arbitrarily directed to work and are carrying on grudgingly will walk out of their present employment. Damages 'may also be claimed by persons who have been gaoled or fined for refusing to obey man-power directions. Since the beginning of this year alone two have been gaoled and 30 fined. INDUSTRIAL CONSCRIPTION. Political observers have suggested various theories as to what action the Government would take if the High Court's finding was unfavourable. One writer proposed that the Government would, take over the administration of all firms vitally engaged in war work, thus placing employees on its own pay list. This would amount to nationalisation or socialisation of industry, which the Government has denied is its aim. How seriously the Government views the position was indicated by the Minister for Labour and Industry, Mr. J. Holloway, who . said: "Whatever the fina,l decision of the High Court may be, a certain loss in production and a weakening in public discipline and morale must occur. Some writers recently seem to think they have discovered some terrible truths when they refer to the power to direct labour as being industrial conscription. My answer to that is, 'Yes, of course, it is industrial conscription.' But it always has been so obvious that one wonders why it should be news to anyone. "What is more, as all students of Australian politics know, conscription of any kind' is more repugnant to Labour members than any other section of the community. But the Labour Government meant what it said when it declared that winning the war and thus saving Australia was the first consideration, and all other 'isms' were, to be temporarily set aside until the Nazis and Fascists were defeated. However, compulsion in the direction of labour has been restricted to the least possible degree, and will be avoided as much as possible in the future. A temporary relaxation of the cherished principles in our realised determination to defeat Fascism is much better than permanent subjugar tion of them all, which would be the lot if we were defeated."