ARBITRATION

Hawke's Bay Tribune, Volume XVII, Issue 213, 23 August 1927, Page 3

ARBITRATION

RUMOURED READJUSTMENTS THE PREFERENCE CLAUSE. AUCKLAND OPINION DIVIDED. (Special to “Tribune.”) Auckland, Aug. 23. The foreshadowed remoulding of the New Zealand Arbitration Court system has created much expectant conjecture among members of Parliament, employers and trades unionists. Auckland opinion on the soundness of the rumoured readjustments is divided. Some have cordial support for the abolition of the preference to unionists clauses; others believe that pfeference is a vital and essential principle. Certain local party leaders believe the introduction of piecework payments will be beneficial, but there is an opposing school of thought. SPECULATIVE REPORT. There is current a speculative report that the constitution of the Arbitration Court is to be drastically changed by the substitution of two Judges, completing a judicial trinity, for employers’ and employees’ assessors “Our confidence in the Court is not likely to be increased if we have

no representative at all on the bench,” remarked Mr. T. Bloodworth, the Auckland Labour leader, with whom the question was discussed. Mr. Bloodworth did not believe the appointment of three Judges in place of the existing bench would be a sa’tis-

factory innovation. “The Judges,” he said, “would be supposed to be impartial, but if they had any leaning at all it would be cowards the employers rather than to us.” Piecework, he pointed out, was already in force in many trades, such as tailoring and coaehbuilding, but there were others to which it could not be applied. Mr. AV. E. Sill, another Trades Hall representative, adopts the opposite view, that the presence of opposing assessors on the Arbitration

Court is, in practice, of no value. Neither of them, through the fact of his representing definite interests, could apply strictly judicial consideration to any bill.

NOT READY FOR PIECEAVORK. “The country is not ready for piecework,” said Mr. Sill, after pointing out that many workers—slaughtermen for instance—were at present paid by results. With piecework, the trouble was that the employers insisted on regarding the rates earned by the best men as typical of the wages they were paying. That had been done constantly in the freezing industry. Mr. Sill added that many of the enactments reflecting credit upon New Zealand could not have come into existence without the co-opera-tion of powerful labour unions. For that reason he strongly deprecated the abolition of the preference clauses.

“The policy of the Emploj’ers' Association is definite on the points of preference and piecework,” said Mr. H. E. AVright, well-known as an Arbitration Court advocate in the employers’ interests ,who said his association was definitely against the former and in favour of the latter. As to the suggested remoulding of the Court’s constitution, he said he could not make any comment until the Employers’ Association had discussed the subject and formulated its official verdict. The same attitude was taken by Mr. AV. J Cousins, vice-president of the Employers’ Association, who affirmed the association’s dislike to the preference clauses and its support for the piecework system.