ARBITRATION ACT.

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume XXXV, Issue 11249, 13 April 1908, Page 2

ARBITRATION ACT.

(To the Editor of the. Hetsrttl.V ' Sir, — Our latev Premier admitted just prior, to his death : "That since the inception of the Arbitration Act. the cost of living had increased 33 per cent, whilst the rate of wages had only risen 8 l-3rd per cent." Perhaps this is where I as a married man come m for my share of the loaves and fishes, or is it' tho "benefits derived" from Mr Catton's martyrdom m the open,, but it may -be -as . he^ stated;' "competition controlling the prices. I beg to inform him that it is. not always the man who crows loudest m publiu or delights m seeing his name immortalised m trade union minute books that does the most for labor; also that posterity requires principles of life from us and riot names. Mr Catton has surely not read the" writing on the wall, if he has not perceived a more equitable and sound constructive system evolving and gradually displacing the rotten fabric or apology for a system -which society depends upon today, and it is a. bad admission coming from one holding such a politico-indus-trial position as be does. , There is just .a tinge of humor m his references to the Act and the prices of carrots, etc., but instead of usirnr the word natural he ought to have put unnatural conditions, which ho will , find is correct if he sifts into the problem a little further. Mr Catton and Mr Powell both are misled if they believe I attack "the administration, for my two questions are relative to the Act itself, and as yet they have not been answered. I did not desire "that employers should employ workmen when the employers have nothing^ for them ,to do, and I would refer Mr Catton to my questions again. Employers are but victims of the competitive system the same as workers are, and it was not as an aggressor against ' any individual that urged.- me to ask thosfe questions re the Act— it was after listening to politicians 'and their patrons and residing m the press of how perfect a machine the Act was for ameliorating the lot of employer and employe that I decided to ask questions from a married worker's viewpoint. \ I. invariably .attack the competitive system for seeing that the incentive undeij that system is to gain at another's 1055... I cannot believe that labor and capital can be reconciled, the one employing the other (not out of sentiment) but to make money profit. I believe the gradual resumption of all that human life depends upon by the democratic State, intellectually managed by the democratic community, and it is because I see that the Act is a temporary debar to that gradual process of righteous restoration by way of making the workers believe they possess that which they possess not and tends to foster a false sense of security and blind contentment that impels me to put those questions at this stage. — I am etc.. JAMES JENKINS.