ARBITRATION LAW

Otago Witness, Issue 2925, 6 April 1910, Page 25

ARBITRATION LAW

COMMONWEALTH* COURT'S POWERS. SYDNEY,. March 30. An important point in arbitration law has been decided by the High Court. The question of law submitted for determination was whether under the Constitution ■ it was competent for the Commonwealth Court of Conciliation amid Arbitration to make any award which was inconsistent with certain awards or determinations of State Wages Boards. The contention was set up that in making an award in a dispute extending beyond the limits of a State the president of the Arbitration Court was not bound by any State law regulating an industry, but might prescribe whatever he thought necessary in order to bring about an effectual settlement. " The Chief Justice said that arbitration meant primarily a determination by a tribunal which was not an ordinary court of justice bound to administer the strict rules of common statute law, but which was a tribunal selected by parties to a controversy, to which both submitted themselves, and by whose determination they agreed to be bound. The efficacy of an award was derived from the agreement of submission. Although statutory provisions for its enforcement -were now commonly adopted, the foundation of the authority of airbitrators was the consensual agreement of the parties. In the course of time the meaning: had been extended so as -to include a determination by arbiters, some of whom were, not neoassari.lv the free choice of the parties, but this difference in the mode of choice did not alter the fundamental motion of the ■ functions of a.n arbiter, vhiVb waw to make a determination f-Hat the nartW were _ bound to obey. If. followed that whatever the parties could lawfully agree

to do they might be ordered to do, and whatever they could not lawfully agree to do they could not he ordered to do by the tribunal. These conclusions wot© incontrovertible as far as regarded an arbitration tribunal which had been lawfully established within any civilised State.

, By a majority the court answered the question in the negative.