"N.Z.Industry Bound ii Strait Jacket”

Sun (Auckland), Volume I, Issue 260, 24 January 1928, Page 1

"N.Z .lndustry Bound ii Strait Jacket”

PROFESSOR TOCKER’S *** views

SJffIRESS TO VICTORIAN

As^octation. — Copyright. SIC 10& *jn. MELBOURNE, To-day the operation of the compulsory arbitration Zealand, Professor A. H. a ... of Canterbury College, in T «ldress to members of the Vicchamber of Manufacturers, (o «r«ssed the opinion that the ..m had failed to do the things •<SS k was created to do. He a return to collective Ergslnlng between employers and tmploy*®*' .....try in a young country, he said, h,re flexible adjustments mutul“°Satisfactory to employers and ■nrees and should be made 'to '“conditions in particular branches "Arbitration Court,” continued } M ,or Tocher, “is a piece of legal set up between parties in e,«trr which prevents them coming wther and forces them both to orfor contention rather than for "'professor Tocker said that In New ...iTnH compulsory arbitration was Produced 30 years ago, primarily “A. a.. object of ensuring industrial lice In that it had failed, especially Sf recent years. From 1921 until this ;e»r strikes had become increasingly common. COURT’B INFLUENCE Tbe court had developed along lines H ver intended, the effects whereof were never fully considered. While the scope of the court's Investigations T ,n limited to conditions of only •hoot one-fourth of the wage-earners of the community, it made awards which were binding over a far larger held end had a profound influence on other industries. The minimum wage hied hr the court became in almost erery esse the standard wage. No incruses ware provided for skill or productivity, and no allowance was made ior human variability. Payment by nnlia was penalised. Dbputes were frequently created to lire the court work to do. Industry, He said, was bound In a itrait jacket, which prevented apartments, decreasing producticiv and increasing costs.

Tbs burden arising out of the systn ultimately fell upon the shoulders M the consumers and on the unsheltered primary industries. —A. and N.Z.