IRRELEVANT!

New Zealand Times, Volume XLIX, Issue 11303, 31 August 1922, Page 5

IRRELEVANT!

ARGUMENT IN COURT SIAIILARITY OF SEAMENS AND OFFICERS’ DUTIES. UNION SECRETARY OVERRULED. The refusal of a witness in the Arbitration Court yesterday to answer a question put to him in the course of cross-examination led to an argument between the president of the court (Air Justice Frazer) and the secretary of the Seamen’s Federation (Mr W. T. Young) on a point of relevancy. Mr Young asked: If a deck hand is required to work in port any eight hours in the twenty-four, do you consider it is necessary for an officer or an engineer to be on duty to .see tbat. he performs his duties as required? The witness (Captain A. W. Bold) said that, as a member of the Merchant Service Guild, he did not think he could be fairly expected to answer. His Honour forbade the comparison with another class «if work. There wero instances, he said, in which men worked without the supervision of their officers —the donkevmen, for instance, who worked at night. Mr Young was bringing up another dispute, under which tho workers norformed a very different class of work from seamen. Mr Young: I don’t see the slightest difference, from tho practical point of view. THE QUESTION UNFAIR. His Honour: Officers and engineers form part of • another organisation, have an entirely different award, and ha’re raised entirely different questions in tlieir own dispute. Mr Young: I submit it makes not the slightest difference on board ship. In asking the question, Be said, he merely wished to see if the witness wanted the same conditions to apply to the members of his organisation as applied to the members of the union. The witness had evaded the questions put to him all througE. His Honour: It is not evasion. The question is not strictly fair. Mr Young submitted it was quite fair. His Honour: It is not quite relevant. Tt is certainly unfair to press the witnesn upon a matter that is foreign to this dispute altogether. Mr Young: Well, if the witness will not answer the question, will Your Honour withdraw the whole of his evidence? His TToilour: No. Why should I? Mr Young: I cannot possibly conduct a dispute under these circumstances. His Honour: That ie rather an extraordinary statement to make. You have had a very fair share of the time occupied in the hearing of the dispute. So far as this particular matter is concerned, I think we are off the point. A QUESTION OF LATITUDE. Mr Young: “We have been brought into the court by the other side, and in meeting them expect a certain latitude ’’ “ and you have it.” “ in the examination of witnesses.” His Honour said there were certain limits to the latitude allowed in crossexamination, and the witness was entitled to shelter himself behind a question of relevancy. He could not see that the conditions of work of engineers or deck officers were so closely allied to the responsibilities of deckhands that the conditions of one must necessarily apply to the other. Mr Young argued tbat the two disputes were interlocked, and could not be separated. An officer’s responsibilities required that he should he on duty at the same time a* tb« men. After further palaver, His Honour allowed the witness to answer the question as he liked. RULES OF THE' COURT. Captain Bold said that the conditions of the officer and the deck hand were entirely different. The officer was a certificated man who had to undergo medical and general tests, while there were many other qualifications which separated him from the deck hand. Mr Young was again brought up by His Honour as he began to press further questions. Mr Young: This is the first case of this character, Your Honour, in which I have ever been ruled out. His Honour: I don’t know about that, hut I have had a little experience in th's icourt, and I think I know the rules fairly well. Mr Young said he, too, had had some experience. His Honour: I am willing to meet you to this extent. Mr Young—in regard to the point that an officer has to pass certain teats. I would not let that influence my mind. Mr Young: This is a very important matter to us. We are not going to sithere and hear a' man give evidence in favour of others being worked and messed about any time during the twenty-four hours, as the witness desires. Judging by the evidence he has given he is just the sort of man who would mess the men about! Mr W. G. Smith (Union Company’s representative): I protest, Your Honour. His Honour: Personally, I don’t aoree with his answer that because an officer his to pass examinations and certain tests he should he entitled to work different hours. Mr Young said he supposed that, by following the same line of argument, the court would declare that waterside Workers’ conditions had nothing to do with seamen’s work. His Honour: directly. “NEXT TIME.” Mr Young said that if the seamen ever came before the court again—and he hoped they would not—he would have to subpoena every member or the organisation to come to court and give evidence. His Honour said ho would have to rule that out. Mr Young said that the whole of the mercantile marine would have to stop until the dispute was settled. Evidence would have to be brought to combat the statements of such witnesses as Captain Bold, who had evaded nearly every important question that had been put to him. After some further exchangee, Mr Young was persuaded to proceed with his cross-examination on other points.