The Timaru Herald TUESDAY, AUGUST 25, 1908. FARMERS AND ARBITRATION.

Timaru Herald, Volume XIIC, Issue 13681, 25 August 1908, Page 4

The Timaru Herald TUESDAY, AUGUST 25, 1908. FARMERS AND ARBITRATION.

So far from' having finished with the dispute brought- against the employers of Canterbury by the Farm Labouieis Union, the agricultural community will be wise to realise that the signal for battle in real earnest has only just been given by the refusal .of 'the Arbitration Court to make ail, award 1 in the, case. The question has now been removed from the* legal to the political arena. As-, we anticipated-.on Saturday, when we based jour- comments upon, the imperfect information afforded by a- brief and necessarily inadequate 'telegraphic summary of the judgment, then? is to be an immediate J appeal to Parliament. The executive of fjie;: Farm Labourers' Union has lost no •time in seeking -. to obtain from every labour organisation in New Zealand' an endorsement of its demand for the removal from .office of the Judge who, after all their exertions,' declined', to interfere in the regulation of the fanning industry. It iti tgo much io hope that other labour bodied w-ill 'tUrn tdieir backs.upon this preposterous proposal, for we fear that the sentiment of loyalty which prompted a ready moral and' financial support in the case of the Blackball strikers will also consolidate the ranks of labour against the Judge who . has. incurred the odium . of one:", of its strongest sections. ■ We do not suppose, howwever, that Par-. liament will accede to 'this frenzied demand for the bead! of the offending Judge. New Zealand lias not yet J l marched! far enough alohg the road 1 of American politico to' place the jiidiciary at the mercy of the mob.. And still it must be clear <Q every employer ~ that this • is no time for the farmers to sit down and flatterthemselves that, having won their case, they are henceforth free . from anxiety about outside, interference with 'their business. The temper of the working classes is sufficiently: indicated' in the expressions of opinion' collected by - a member of our staff yesterday and published in our columns this morning. In other centres, the language, employed 1 by 'the critics of the judgments, is far stronger anything that has been. said air Timaru/. tfd'-.

behind the words there are the preparations for action. Apart froni the petitions for the removal o£ Mr Jmrtice Sim, there is to be systematic organising work throughout Canterbury, and, we daresay, throughout New Zealand. For what purpose? l)oes anyone suppose that tho ufticers of the Farm Labourers' Union are going to repeat the work lliey put. into the preparation and argument of the case that, has gone against tlieiu without some guarantee that 'ihe whole of their work will not be nullified by the refusal of the Judge to make tin award? Parliament alone can furnish them with the guarantee they need, and it is to Parliament, rather than to tho Court, that/ they will direct their nest elt'orts. A general election is claw at hand, and' the I'imo therefore could not be more propitious for the campaign they aro setting on foot. How are the •'farmers of Canterbury going to meet that attack? In the recent proceedings they threw 'their burdens upon the shoulders of three men, but no three men can save them from defeat at the polls a mouth or two hence if they remain the disorganised rabble that, 'lliey have been for many an election past. The time has come now when they need a strong ]jolitical leader ijuito as milch as they needed capable and determined representatives before the Conciliation Board' and 'the Arbitration Court. They know how the GovenmK'iiti stand in respect to the inclusion of fanners in the scope of the Arbitration Act. They know the reply given by the Minister of Labour to the suggestion put forward by the Farmers' Union tiliat the agricultural industry should be exempted' from tlio operations of. the Act. The Hon."Mr Millar declared: that the Government had absolutely no 'sympathy with the suggestion, and if he was sincere, the Government camiot infuse to amend the law si> that the tribunal set up to carry out the intention of 'the legislature shall be unable to escape its task, liowever difficult or however dangerous the (icconiplishm'ent of it may be. That is the true lesson of the judgment in the farm labourers' case. It is no 'time for jubilation or self-satisfaction ■ for the farmers, but a time to get ready for a struggle more difficult and' more <lelermined than the one from which they have emerged.