LABOUR DISPUTES

Gisborne Herald, Volume LXVIII, Issue 20624, 27 November 1941, Page 5

LABOUR DISPUTES

BASIS OF SETTLEMENT AMERICAN BILL PENDING FORCED ARBITRATION (Reed. Nov. 27, 10 a.m.) WASHINGTON, Nov. 26. The House of Representatives Labour Committee directed Mr. Ramspeck to prepare a bill embodying the principles agreed upon at the White House conference. . The bill will contain provision, first for negotiation between the management and employees; secondly, conciliation by the Labour Department; thirdly, mediation by a statutory board empowered to ban strikes for a reasonable period during the mediation proceedings; fourthly, compulsory arbitration in disputes which are not settled by the foregoing, or if the President directs in the interests of defence. Mr. Ramspeck explained that when a strike or other labour stoppage was threatened in a defence plant, the dispute would go through successive steps of normal collective bargaining, conciliation, mediation and, finally, at the President’s discretion, compulsory arbitration. Therefore, both sides were bound in advance to accept the Arbitration Board’s decision. If the workers refused they would lose their rights under the Wagner Act, virtually depriving them of their collective bargaining rights and rendering their union ineffective. If an employer was recalcitrant the Government could take over his plant. President Roosevelt announced that the railroad dispute for which a strike has been called to begin on December 7 has been referred back to the Emergency Fact Finding Board which has been asked to report by December 1. The board previously recommended the compromise increases in pay which the management accepted, but the brotherhoods of teamsters rejected. A series of conferences between the management and the union representatives have since been held, including several at the White House. A message from St. Louis says that the labour relations expert of the Office of Production Management, Mr. Joseph Keenan, asserted that the St. Louis strike of 8500 machinists was the “most important and most serious tie-up throughout the nation.”

Mr. Keenan flew from Washington in an effort to settle the jurisdictional dispute which has shut down one aircraft factory, curtailed the Curtiss Wright Company’s production and paralysed 400 other industrial plants.