FARMERS AND ARBITRATION.

Gisborne Times, Volume LV, Issue 6184, 15 September 1921, Page 2

FARMERS AND ARBITRATION.

“NEITHER SANE NOR SOUND.”

RECENT DECISIONS OF ARBITRATION 'COURT.

Some very strong opinions were voiced by members of the Wellington Provincial branch of the Farmers’ Union at the meeting of the executive held in Palmerston North, when a remit forwarded by the Wanganui branch came up for discussion:— “That this executive is of opinion that the conditions regarding the cost of labor and other charges relating to killing and freezing fat stock are at present such as must have the effect of practically killing the industry and. therefore any offer to the labor unions such as would bo likely to satisfy them is impossible; that the onus of fixing the rate of wages should be thrown on the Arbitration Court, and that a .farmers’ representative be given the right to give evidence when disputes affecting them were heard.” After Mr C. Smith (Wanganui) had ‘formally tabled the motion the chairman (Mr W. J. Poison) said that the matter was of intense interest to farmers, and one on which he felt very strongly. The news had just been published of the shearers’ award in which the Arbitration Court had granted the men a rate of 26s 4d—a figure which was bound to have a disastrous effect on the pastoralists. The freezing employees (slaughtermen) were asking 45s a hundred, It was a bad state of affairs that permitted the freezing companies and its employees to come to some mutual arrangement whereby the extra cost to the companies should be passed on to the producer. They were the victims of a similar arrangement between the shipowners and the wharf laborers, and it was necessary that the producers should make an emphatic protest against these arrangements to which the farmer was not a party, and endeavour to have the whole ' onus of fixing rates, etc., thrown upon the Arbitration Court. Mr Burrell, of Feilding, had declared the other day that the Court had outlived its usefulness, and should be abolished. The speaker did not go quite that far, but he certainly thought that the Coiirt had gone mad and that its recent decisions were on neither sane nor sound economic lines, and something must be done to bring it to its senses. If the rate for freezing hands was to be arranged for, sav, the next three years, without consulting the Court, the companies would be courting disaster! The last Dominion conference had been attended by representatives of the freezing companies, but the farmers’ delegates had received very little satisfaction from them. They admitted that they were quite prepared to compromise with the employees to some extent, and that was what the farmers were up against. A suggestion that the farmers should have representation on the boards of the freezing companies bad not come to anything. Messrs. J. A. McLeavey, A. Buchanan and 0. P. Lynch voiced similar opinions, and supported the “diehard” attitude of the president. Mr McLean (Raetihi) reminded the meeting that the decisions of the Arbitration Court were the law of the land, and if they did not abide by its dicta they would virtually be striking. (Hear,' hear) and would thus bring themselves into grave disrepute. Because things were against them for the moment, that was not the time to declare that the Court had outgrown its usefulness. He, personally, would abide loyally by any order that the Court made. Members: “I won’t!” In reply to Mr Buchanan, the chairman said that the Court fostered and encouraged private agreements. PREFERENCE TO UNIONISTS. The only solution to the problem, declared Air Lynch, was the abolition of the preference to unionists clause. Mr Buchanan thought that the old order of strikes and lockouts was preferable to the legal impositions of the Court. They would have better luck without it. He had advocated the abolition of the Court consistentlv.

The motion was carried unanimously, and it was decided to forward a copy of the remit to the conference of freezing works, sitting in Wellington.