SUMMARY FOR EUROPE.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 14103, 6 January 1908, Page 1 (Supplement)

SUMMARY FOR EUROPE.

POLITICAL AND GENERAL:

While the past four weeks havo provided little of political moment, those ■who watch the industrial movements in the country have found much to excite their interest and, also, to arouse their concern. In the coal mining industry a situation of great delicacy ha 6 cropped up on the West Coast. Under a law which was enacted last session, the "bank-to-bank" clause was applied to the coal mining .industry, irrespective of Arbitration Court awards. The operative section provides that "a miner shall be paid overtime when he is employed underground in a mine for more than eight hours in any one day, counting from the time lie enters the underground workings of. the mine to the time he leaves the flame." In the Denniston mine, one of •".lie collieries worked by the' West port 'toal Company, the principal corporation m the kind in New Zealand, it takes a aviner about twenty minutes to travel between the mouth and tho iace, so that if his working day is to consist of eight hours' the actual time for which he will be employed at the face will be that period less forty minutes. Under an agreement arrived at, however, in March last, between the Company and the Miners' Union, it was decided that- the men should be employed at their work for eight hours a day, and a nominal scale of overtime was arranged which should be paid to the miners for the time they were underground in excess of the eight houra. This agreement was embodied in an award o f the Arbitration Court and ■ was made legally binding on both parties and enforceable by law. But when the legislation of last 6e6sion was passed;* the Miners' Union, ignoring the agreement and the award, notified the men that they were to work for eight hours only from surface to surface. The Union was thereupon cited for a breach of award. The Arbitration Court decided that the Union was quite wrong in the position which it had taken up in the matter. It held that the underground workers who are working on shift wages must work eight hours at the face before the) are entitled to receive the wages fixed by tho award, and when they have worked these hours they are entitled to be paid in addition the overtime rates fixed by the award of March last for the time occupied in proceeding from the bank to the face'and from the face to the bank. As tho Union had apparently acted under a misapprehension, the Court did not inflict any fine upon it, but it warned it that any repetition of the offence would be visited by severe punishment. Despite this, however, the Union continues to disobey the award. The authority of the Court has been flouted, and is being flouted daily, and the only mitigating circumstance would seem -to be that the Company is permitting the men to work the reduced hours. The Miners' Union is fcaid to be taking steps to have a case stated for the Court of Appeal upon the point of whether the law of last session does not override the award of March last; and it may be assumed that the Union will have to answer to the Arbitration Court for its continued defiance of 'the award and decision. In another part of this island trouble nas been brewing among the workere in the sawmills—a very numerous- body of men. The old award of tho Arbitration Court, which they did not regard as very satisfactoiy, has ; run out. In terms of thelaw, the award remains operative, so long as the parties are subject to the jurisdiction of the Court, pending the delivery of a fresh award or the execution of an industrial agreement. A conference between representatives of tho sawmillem and the workere has proved abortive, and there liavs been some suggestions on the part of the men that they should cancel .the registration, of their .Union—a, step which they are entitled to take now that the term of the currency of the award, as fixed by the Court, has expired—and thus put them in a position to contract directly with the employers, and, if they should choose, to strike in order, if possible, to enforce their demands. Extreme counsels have fortunately not prevailed with tho Union, lor its executive has been empowered to negotiate further, with the employers for a settlement.

The Houses of Parliament, with which is associated the history of the legislation of New Zealand for the past forty years, were the scene of a destructive fire in Wellington on the morning l of the 11th nit. Fortunately, the parliamentary library, containing an exceedingly valuable collection of literature, has been, within the past few yeans, housed in a separate wiiig, so constructed as to be fire-proof, and it withstood the test; but the great bulk of the buildings were burned beyond the nope of restoration. In one sense, ine loss of the wooden portion of the structure is not to 'be regretted. The building was old: and decayed, while architecturally it was an offence; and a scheme for its gradual demolition and for its replacement by a substantial and durable pile had been virtually adopted by Parliament and entered upon. Ite destruction by >fire means simply that an expenditure , which, in other circumstances, would have been spread over several years .nust be incurred in tho next eighteen months or two years. But the fire consumed large collections of - statutes, blue books, and other works of reference, a number of interesting and valuable paintings and grouped photographs of members of the Parliaments of the past, and the contents of some of the rooms occupied by Ministers and officers of Parliamentaltogether a serious loss. The question of tho accommodation of the Legislature next year liae engaged the attention of the Government, and it has been derided to accept an offer, generously made by his Excellency the Governor, of the use of his official residence, known as Government House, for the session. It.has, indeed, been proposed by the Prime Minister that «ie Government House site shall be permanently adopted as that of Parliament Buildings; that the departmental buildings shall be transferred' to the site of Parliament Buildings; and that a fresh residence shall be found elsewhere for the Governor. This project, it will be seen, contemplates the erection of three new buildings instead of only the one which the fire renders it absolutely necessary to build, and its magnitude, impressive though it may be, has not commepded it widely to the public.

On the firet day of the year, amid the most cordial demonstrations of goodwill, , the Antarctic exploration steamer Nimrod took her departure from Lyttelton for the South Polar regions. Lieutenant Shackleton, who is in charge of the expedition, was greatly cheered while in New Zealand by the interest that was shown in his project and by the practical assistance that was offered to him. The Government, in anticipation of a vote which will be proposed to Parliament next session, granted £1000 the cost

of the expedition, and this, supplementing a vote of £5000 from the Australian Commonwealth, assured the finance of the enterprise. Besides this, the Government arranged with the Union Steam Ship Company for the services of the steamer Ivoonya to tow the Nimrod down to the ice a valuable aid to the expedition in respect of the economy in coal consumption which it enables the exploration steamer to effect-.

We have to record the death during the past month of Mr Aloysius Macdonald, manager of the Bank of New South Wales, Wellington; Mr H. Buckland, sheep farmei, of Waikouaiti; Mr Simon M'Douald; a well-known resident of Dunedin; the Rev. James Duncan, the oldest Presbyterian minister in the Dominion, in which he had lived since 1844; and Mr A. Bayly, president of the New Zealand Rugby Football Union. A great deal of regret lias been expressed throughout the Dominion over the news of the death in Paris of Mr J, C. Wilkin, general manager of the Lyttclton Times Company.

The annual lawn tennis championships of New Zealand were decided during the jt New Plymouth. H. A. Parker, now resident in New South Wales, recovered the men's singles championship, which he had held in the past, and Miss Nunneley once more defended successfully her title to the ladies' singles championship.