THE H.B. TRIBUNE FRIDAY, AUGUST 12, 1927 DIFFERING INDUSTRIAL METHODS.

Hawke's Bay Tribune, Volume XVII, Issue 204, 12 August 1927, Page 4

THE H.B. TRIBUNE FRIDAY, AUGUST 12, 1927 DIFFERING INDUSTRIAL METHODS.

THE Australian Industrial Mission which has devoted some months to an investigation of the conditions that have brought about, or at any rate are coincident with, so great apparent prosperity in the United States has returned home and is expected shortly to submit its report to the Federal Government. It cannot, however, be said that there is any very assured prospect that the result will be any very decided change either in the methods pursued by employers or employees, or in the relations existing between the two classes. In the first place, it has been made very manifest that what has been learned will scarcely commend itself for adoption by the trade unionists of Australia as nt present controlled. Everything has, in fact, pointed to a system which is at very definite variance with the “principles” that govern trade unionism in the Commonwealth, and which have, indeed, to some extent at least, been adopted in this country also. On the other hand, it may well prove that, though the employers’ representatives on the Mission may have been deeply impressed with what they have seen, they will not able to recommend the changes thus suggested, and that simply because the capital for carrying them out is not available in Australia as in America. The lengthy reports provided nv the correspondents accompanying the Mission still continue to appear n the Australian Press. Some extracts from earlier reports have already been given in this column, but it mav be worth while to provide one or two more from those appearing in newspaper files "isl to hand.. As an cxm'-nlo wo may take Hartford, the <;q-i;a] of Connecticut State. Tliei'e the industries are

almost entirely operated on the “open shop” basis. Under this plan it is stated "any desirable applicant may obtain employment on the basis of ability to do the required work.’’ Because of the economic advantage of the "open shop” it is claimed that millions of dollars of capital can lie attracted to the industrial enterprises of the city, and the employee has been given the opportunity io "capitalise his ability and forge ahead on merit,” and has "afforded to him a maximum of economic security by reducing to a minimum strikes and lockouts.” (There have been only three strikes in Hartford in two years; two having been settled by compromise, the third failed.) The "open shop” has safeguarded the interests of the public, it is claimed, by "eliminating agreements between capital and labour, which place the burden of unearned wages and unfair profits on the shoulders of the consumer.” But, then, of course, the “open shop” is absolute anathema to the Australian trade unionist, who also has no great concern about the consumers, even though most of them may be fellow workers.

On the other hand, wherever the Mission has gone its employer members have been faced with the latest and most efficient laboursaving machinery. The evidence gathered from the manufacturers has shown that, whenever some new device of this character has become available, it is at once installed and the machinery previously in use is regarded as obsolete and incontinently "scrapped.” But recourse of this kind can be taken only where capital reserves and resources are practically unlimited, as is the case just now in the. United States. In Australia, even although the adoption of new means of production might be regarded as almost assuredly profitable, the capital to provide them is not always easily to be got. In fact, with the relations of Capital and Labour such as they are there, but very few who have money to invest will entrust it to industrial concerns, This is a reaction of the strike and "ca’ canny” policy pursued by trade unionists of which they do not seem to realise the profound importance. Least of all are the workers them selves inclined to commit their savings to the promotion of undertakings whose profitable activities are apt to be frequently interrupted by the strike and like vagaries of fellow workers. In America, on the other hand, the thrifty worker, having firet provided himself with a home, scarcely ever looks otherwhere than to industrial concerns—most frequently to that in which he is himself employed—for an investment. In this way, in the aggregate, many millions of the workers’ savings go to increase the avenues of employment. The only hope for the secondary industries of Australia, and also for those of New Zealand—and we must have more of them if this country is to become adequately populated—lies in the promotion of some more hearty spirit of co-operation between employers and employees. It is the lack of this and the failure to recognise that better wages must necessarily depend on a corresponding greater production, that keep back industrial expansion. There may, of course, le want of enterprise on the part of those with tai to invest. But no one is entitled to expect any such investment to be made unless reasonable security is forthcoming. Such security is anything but apparent in industrial undertakings that are not only called upon to pay wages incompatible with the profits earned, but are also liable to frequent dislocations over the most trifling differences between employers and employees. Trade union leaders—at least those of whom the public hears most-~are full of fine “principles ’ with regard to the safeguarding r what they consider the rights and interests of their followers. Possibly they would meet with greater an.l easier success in this direction were they concurrently to study the "principles” that so obviously govern the ability of the employers to meet their so frequent "demands.”