IMPORTANT TRADES UNION CASE

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXXIV, Issue 10627, 16 December 1897, Page 5

IMPORTANT TRADES UNION CASE

DECISION OF THE HOUSE OF i; ( ~LORDS. ; A WORKMAN'S INDIVIDUAL. ' LIBERTY. ' Press Association.—Klectrlc Telegraph.—Cop/tijlit. . . u London, December 15. ' In the action Allen versus Flood, the House of Lords allowed the appeal with costs. . This was a case in which two workmen, Flood and Taylor, recovered damages from- Allen, the ' London delegate of the Boilermakers' Union. Some dispute arose .between the shipwrights and boilerniakers as to the limits of their respective , work. Both Flood and Taylor, as shipwrights, were discovered to have done ironwork in another yard. Allen informed the manager of the Glengall Iron Company that if the two men were not discharged the other men, would strike. The men were discharged, and took action against Allen. The jury awarded a verdict for the plaintiffs, which the Court of Appeal subsequently confirmed.

In delivering the present judgment Lords Halsbury, Ashbourne, and Morris upheld the Court of Appeal, but Lords Herschell, Watson, MacNaghten, Shaud, Davey, and James of Hereford reversed the decision of the Courts below.

Lord Herschell held that the act of Allen, was prima facie a lawful one, and not unlawful or actionable on account of the motives dictating it. .

Lord MacNagliten said the decision did not impair the law relating to oppressive combination and boycotting.

The Standard remarks that the decision, as a severe blow struck at a workman's individual liberty of action, is the most important militant trades unionism has ever wrested from a legal tribunal.