USE OF UNION FUNDS.

New Zealand Herald, Volume L, Issue 15480, 11 December 1913, Page 8

USE OF UNION FUNDS.

VOTE FOR WATERSIDERS,

QUESTION OF LEGALITY.

SUPREME COURT ARGUMENT.

[BY TELFGRAI'H.—PRESS ASSOCIATION'.]

Wellington, Wednesday.

] As one of the issues of tho strike tho j Supreme Court has been called upon to | decide a point as to whether a union is ! legally justified in making a grant in aid ! of the. wives and children of strikers. The ! question is an important one, affecting, as ; it does, all trades and industrial unions of the Dominion. Tim case arose out of the action of the Wellington Typographical Union of Workers, in voting a sum of £100 to the waterside workers strike fund. Tho action, a friendly one, was brought under tho Declaratory judgments Act, 1907, : plaintiff being John 'William F. McD,ugall, lof Lower Iltitt, compositor, and deiundants the Wellington Typographical Industrial Union of Workers. Plaintiff's affidavit stated that he was secretary of the defendant union. On the Bench were. Their Honors the Chief Justice (Sir Robert Stout) and Mr. Justice Chapman. Mr. D. j M. Findlay, directed by defendant union, I appeared for plaintiff, Mr. P. J. O'Regan I for the Waterside Workers' Union, and ! Dr. J. W. Salmond, K.C., Solicitor-General, for the Attorney-General. Mr. Findlay said it had been the practice generally for trades and industrial unions to make such votes for some time past, and no question had been raised. The Solicitor-General : I take it that the question does not affect trades unions. Mr. Findlay : It may do. The Typographical Union was registered under the Industrial Conciliation and Arbitration Act, and not under tho Trades Union Act. The rules of the union were duly passed by the registrar, and he referred Their Honors to ride 3, which, inter alia, stated that one object of the union was to assist members unemployed, and other workers in difficulties. Rule 15 was important, as it limited the extent of a vote to £10, and indicated the methods by which a general or special meeting should decide to assist trade workers- It was agreed that' the mere passing of rules by the registrar did not necessarily give them validity. He urged that the question was whether they were entitled to include such a rule within the "objects." That raised the question as to the exclusivoness or otherwise of the provision in the Act, the queetion being whether sub section 5 of the Arbitration and Conciliation Act limited the scope to industrial unions.

The Chief Justice: The point is whether a typographical union has power to concern itself in matters dealing with, say, the farming industry or the waterside industry. Counsel added that it might come down to the question of whether the vote was in the interests of their specified industry by the objects specified. It seemed clear that this object—to assist the wives and children of strikers—could not be justified if they were limited within the Act. If it were, not justified by the Act, the question might arise, Wore "they justified outside the Act? Counsel further added that the real question was whether a charitable vote could bo made to assist the wives of strikers in another industry. Mr. Justice Chapman: In a way, assisting the men's families assists the men themselves, but tho rule is not very well worded in this respect. 'Mr. Findlay remarked that, briefly put, what was to be decided was whether funds towards the assistance of other workers had to bo applied to the specific industry coming under tho Typographical Union's rules. The majority of the union had voted the money and desired to see the vote substantiated. The Typographical Union was under a Dominion' award, and tho objects of the union might be interpreted to apply only to workers in that industry in other parts of tho Dominion. The Chief Justice: The rule says "coworkers."

The Solicitor-General submitted that an industrial union had no power to spend its funds in maintaining a strike in any distinct unrelated industry.' His point was that a union had no power to take part in a strike which did not directly or immediately concern it. He maintained that it was direct interest only that justified the expenditure of fluids for the Waterside Workers' Union.

Mr. P. J. O'Regan said he was confronted with the difficulty that the Conciliation and Arbitration Act, unlike the Trades Union Act, was an unhistoric statute. During the 19 years it- had been in operation the present was tho first time such a question had arisen. The Act was a working man's statute and the ordinary strict rules of construction, the learned judge had held, did nut apply to tho Act. Although the rules had to be affirmed by the registrar there was nothing requiring them to be revised by a barrister, showing that tho judges held that the Act was not liable to a strict interpretation. The Court reserved its decision.