COURT CROWDED

Gisborne Herald, Volume LXXIII, Issue 21962, 5 March 1946, Page 4

COURT CROWDED

40-HOUR WEEK CLAIM 38 UNIONS INTERVENE PRINTERS' CASE OPENED (9,30 n.m.) MELBOURNE. March 5. So many industrial leaders packed the Arbitration Court when the 40-hour week case was resumed yesterdav that many people were forced to stand. The case is the most important for Australian industry that lias _ come before the court for years. It originated as an examination of the printing industry employees’ union claim for a 40-hour week, but permission was granted when the case came up for the original hearing for Ihe Government and other interested bodies to intervene. This lias had the effect of turning the case into a general one concerning the application of a 40-ho.ur week to industry.

The opening stages of the hearing yesterday were confined to argument as to whether (he court should restrict itself to the application for a 40-hour week in the printing industry or whether this should be broadened to take in the larger question.

Leave was asked for the Australasian Council of Trade Unions to intervene along with 38 unions. Counsel for the printers said he had difficulty in seeing how the other unions were interested in the printers’ claims. He asked that the printers’ case should be heard first.

Mr. Justice Kelly ruled that the Attorney-General was entitled to intervene in any question in which the matter of standard hours of work in any industry was in dispute, but his intervention did not turn the particular cose into a general case. The hearing is proceeding.