THE New Zealand Herald. AND DAILY SOUTHERN CROSS. TUESDAY, JULY 28, 1891.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXVIII, Issue 8630, 28 July 1891, Page 4

THE New Zealand Herald. AND DAILY SOUTHERN CROSS. TUESDAY, JULY 28, 1891.

■;'.... ■. . ~: ,;■ -■ "ii" 11 i» ; .in. :.'■. .;■;'■' ;:. : --y. •. We are afraid , that our respected Resident Magistrate, Dr. Giles, is not sufficiently in advance of the times. On Saturday a young man was brought before him for having failed to comply with an order of " the Court for the maintenance of an illegitimate child, the sum in arrears amounting to £4 53. The defence was that he had not been able to pay the money, having, as a bootmaker, been "called out" by the union. :,■::■ If he had remained in work he could have paid this, which surely was a debt of honour as well as of law, but he had struck at the command of the union, leaving his offspring to become a burden, on the community, or on the confiding mother, who has now no hope, defendant having married "another." Hereupon Dr. Giles proceeded to give defendant a lecture. Defendant could not, he said, excuse himself because he had received instructions from others to leave his employer he was a free agent; no person had the right to give up his employment at the bidding of an outside authority, and thus incapacitate himself from discharging his lawful debts. j If any person who was under an order of the Court to pay certain monies, voluntarily leaves his situation, it was no use for him to say that he was acting under the authority of certain cither persons. And then- Dr. Giles closed his homily by the words :— •' Such authority [as a trades union] was not recognised by the law." . Dr. Giles may be quite right in reason and also in law, but the world is making rapid progress in these days. This erring young man who has allowed himself to get into domestic trouble, honestly put forward his plea as a valid one, and we say that in all probability he is only a little forestalling the state of the law, and seeking to enjoy certain privileges which as yet he has no right to. If Dr. Giles would look at the very next column to that in which the case ia reported, he would see that it is proposed to make trades unions "known to the law. The Factories Bill, which is now before the House, and which , will certainly be passed, provides that "the names of proposed inspectors of factories are to be submitted to the Trades and Labour Council before appointment." Now, these inspectors have enormous powers. The whole working of the Act is in their hands, and if they choose they may harass ! a ! manufacturer out of existence, or at all events out of business. come between the workman < and the master. Their function is to see that the Act is carried out fairly to both parties. One would think that in such a case it would be of great importance that the inspectors should be appointed by an entirely neutral authority, and that they should be men independent of either side. But the law, as it is proposed to be made, virtually gives the appointment into the. hands of the Trades and Labour Council. Probably the Government will consult the leaders of this body before making any selection. At all events, the trades unions have a veto on the appointments, and the inspectors would simply be their nominees. There is no idea, it will be observed, of submitting the names of the men proposed to be appointed to this important office to the Employers' Association. That is regarded as being quite out of the question. ; • If the remark of Dr. Giles, that the authority of the trades unions is not known to the law, comes under notice at Wellington, in all probability a clause will be inserted in some of the Labour, Bills providing that uo person who has been ordered on strike by his union shall be liable to any procedure for debt. If a man has been ordered by the Court to pay foV the bread he has eaten, or for the maintenance of the child he has begotten, he may, by such a clause, be empowered to plead the order of his trades union, and thereupon the Court has no jurisdiction over him. It is a complete bar to the suit. It is quite easy to see that if workmen could plead their debts and obligations as a reason for not going on strike, the proceedings of trades unions might be seriously interfered with, and therefore this difficulty must bo met in some way. No doubt shopkeepers will look at this matter from another point of view. They will think that if a man belongs to a trades union, at whose command he may at any moment have to throw up his employment, he is rather a dangerous subject to deal with, and on no account ought he to be allowed to get into their books. Such a caution must also extend to other relationships, such as that which brought the case • into Court on Saturday.

We are not saying anything against tildes unions. They have their spW ana,on the whale, havo been thenieana or" raising the position of the working man. But it is* now proposed to endow • them with such powers as will con. ~ , ' found the ordinary operations of the ■ law. To give them the power of appoint, ing the inspectors under the Factories Act is to commit to them the whole working of the 'measure, which may be made one of tyranny and oppression to all employers of labour, ...