FREEZING DISPUTE ENDED.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXIII, Issue 19501, 3 December 1926, Page 12

FREEZING DISPUTE ENDED.

To have the freezing dispute ended before it ran any further or developed any more, complications is very satisfactory. Though in maiiy of the works operations had begun with labour not involved in the difference, it is well for all concerned that there need now be no further anxiety over the handling of fat stock as it comes forward. Prospects for the season are stated to be good, even if no sensational prices are anticipated. Therefore it is much better for everybody that there should be no doubt, no anxiety, about having the meat prepared and shipped without delay or dislocation. The award to which exception was taken will be reviewed by the Arbitration Court six months before it is due to expire, any amendment to rates that may be made ruling retrospectively from December 1. In these circumstances it is neither necessary nor desirable to consider whether there is a case for variation of rates. The Court may be left to decide. Whatever the merits of this question, the immediate cause for satisfaction is that the parties have sunk their-differ-ences sufficiently to obtain arbitration on the only terms possible during the currency of the award, a joint application. It only remains now to hope that work will proceed smoothly for the whole of the season, for in the condition of both primary industry and the labour market a prolonged dispute would have been peculiarly undesirable.