ARBITRATION COURT AND UNEMPLOYMENT.

Horowhenua Chronicle, 26 September 1927, Page 5

ARBITRATION COURT AND UNEMPLOYMENT.

OUTSPOKEN ATTACK ON RESTRICTIVE CLAUSES. (By Telegraph—Press Association.) WAIEOA, This Day. At the annual meeting of the Wairoa Farmers' Co-operative Meat Co., Ltd., Mr Jessup, chairman of the company and vice-chairman of the New Zealand Meat "Producers Board said he a year ago called attention to the everincreasing cost of production and forecasted that unless the cost of production was lowered and the country districts absorbed the surplus labour, unemployment would be increased tenfold. It would now be seen that this estimate was exceeded and no attempt was made to get to the root of the trouble and deal with the fundamental facts. „Loans were being raised on all sides to spend on unproductive works for the relief of the unemployed. It was a crime that unemployed should exist in a young country with such undeveloped potentialities and unlimited markets for products. One of the main factors causing unemployment was unquestionably the working of the Arbitration Court, which instead of its original purpose of arbitration became an institution determining remuneration without regard to the value of the article produced. From an economic point of view it was a ghastly farce, blighting efficiency and sapping the whole moral fibre of the country. The Court 's award in the case of watersiders for instance, contained a series of restrictions, but there was no stress laid on the need for efficiency or inducement to facilitate the handling of produce. Similar restrictions applied to the farming industry would mean a serious increase in the price of butter, meat and wool. "Until this act is abolished and the effect of its destructive influence upon New Zealanid industry wiped out unemployment must go on increasing." A resolution was carried unanimously that the industrial conciliation and Arbitration Act be repealed, copies to be sent to the Premier and Hawkes Bay members of Parliament.