WORK AND WAGES.

Evening Star, Issue 15074, 4 January 1913, Page 5

WORK AND WAGES.

TRAMWAY AWARD,

BRISBANE COMPANY APPEAL.

Press Association—By Telegraph—Copyright.

MELBOURNE, January 3. .',• rh ® ?!S h Coi,rt heard an application by the Brisbane Tramway Gompahv for an order restraining Mr Justice Hisrgins from proceeding further with his judgment given in the Commonwealth Arbitration Court on December 23. The company submitted 1 that the award was bad, as being contrary to the Queensland Industrial Peace Act, which prohibits preference. A rule nisi -was made returnable beforethe Full High Court on February 24. [The awards, which wero to come into operation on the Ist inst., .had-reference to the disagreements between the Brisbane Tramway Company and the Adelaide' Municipal Trust, as employers, and the Australian Tramways Employees' Association, as representing the men. In regard to various other companies, agreements either have been or are in process of being made. In the judgment given by Mr Justice Higgins, the Brisbane tramway system in general, and Mr Badger, the manager, in ■particular, .came in for a large elmre of attention. The Brisbane company, His Honor said, "refused to consider an agreement. It objected to everything." "The American manager adhered to the time-honored policy of absolute control over his own employees." "Tho amount of wages to be paid from day to day was absolutely within his discretion. Any good thing which came to the employees must come from the manager's hands. *He did not even believe in wages boards." Hl6 Honor recognised that until the plaintiff tramway employees' association was formed Mr Badger "succeeded in crushing out all attempts to form a true union among his men." He had been able to "stamp out the sparks of unionism before they'"had spread." "One of the usual methods of defeating a real union," His Honor said, " was to foster a bogus union, and this course was taken in the Brisbane case." "Many men also found, on sending in resignations from the plaintiff association, that they received increased wages or got improved conditions." In His Honor's opinion " Mr Badger knew well that if employees resented had conditions of labor they feared unemployment more, and presumably in his capacity of ' benevolent despot' he made Ml and ruthless use of hist knowledge, playing off tho natural desire of the men to support their wives and children against their efforts to unite for improvement of their conditions." His Honor held, however, that " without organisation no system of arbitration was possible." The Brisbane management had, ho said, after full deliberation and some attempts at evasion of the question, declined to give him an undertaking not to discriminate against members of the plaintiff association, and therefore the Court was forced to make an order for preference to unionists against the company, but it would be done in a form so guarded as-not to curtail the efforts to get efficiency, in the service.] CONCILIATION FAVORED IN N.S.W. DISPUTES. SYDNEY, January 3. (Received January 4, at 8 a.m.) At a meeting of the Wages Board to consider the trouble between the shipowners and the Merchant Service Guild, the employers' suggestion to attempt to settle the dispute by conciliation was adopted. A conference between the two bodies will therefore be held, probably on Monday. The .Gas Employees' Union have 'also decided to employ conciliatory methods in connection with their claim for increased payUNREST ON THE COALFIELDS. TROUBLE FEARED. SYDNEY, January 3. (Received January 4, at 8 a.m.) There is much restlessness among the' miners on both the northern and southern coalfields. The men are .dissatisfied . with the ...present rates' of pay and with' other conditions. Trouble is threatening. ' TAXI-CAB STRIKE SPREADING. LONDON, January 3. Eleven thousand persons are affected by the taxi-cab strike. The trouble has spread to Liverpool. LIVERPOOL TROUBLE SETTLED. LONDON, January 3. (Received January 4, at 12.35 p.m.) The taxi-cab strike a.t Liverpool has been settled, tho drivers agreeing to accept a cheaper and lower-grade petrol for use in the vehicles driven by them.