LABOUR LEGISLATION.

Observer, Volume XXI, Issue 1179, 3 August 1901, Page 3

LABOUR LEGISLATION.

The ' Star's ' Corns Trodden Upon. Labour legislation is a most excellent thing— for the other fellow. This hae been the policy of the Star for years past. It mattered nothing to it that Labour legislation was crashing the life out of industrial enterprise and placing intolerable burdens upon the employer class bo long as the Star wbb not touohed. The Star was the trades unionist's paper, and the trades unionist wanted all the rights and advantages, and the devil take the employer. But suddenly a change has come o'er the scene. Trades Union legiElation, with its clumsy, rough-shod foot, has come down heavily upon the Star's particular pet corn. And the Star, with a fioe regard for its own selfiih interests, Bhrieks like a frenzied fiah-wifp. The Factories Act is the particular cause of these hysterics in Shortland3treet. As a matter of faot, it is an arbitrary measure, [but oertainly not any more bo than much of the Labour legislation that has preceded it, and that the Star has championed so enthusiastically. ' Take the printing trade, with which we are specially familiar,' says the Star. 'As there are a number of female typesetters in the colony, a special provision was inserted in the Factories Aot, enabling them when employed on evening newspapers to work until half-past four o'clock on Saturday afternoon. The genius who tinkered up the new Aot has simply struck out the word female and prohibited the employment of any person, male or female, in a printing office, after half-past four o'clook on Saturday, while on Easter Monday and the Sovereign's Birthday type - setters are specially licensed to work, but the employment of machinists, stereotypes, and other descriptions of labour engaged in the production of a paper is absolutely prohibited.' Quite bo. But the Star forgets that this thoughtless tinkering with the laws, creating arbitrary distinctions and restrictions, did not commence with the Factories Act. It has been going on, with the star's warm approval, for the last ten years. Moreover, what is happening to the Star now has been happening year after year to employers in other trades, and the Star has applauded with enthusiasm and vigour equalled only by its hysterical shrieks of dismay now that its own turn has come. The Star complains that the Aot proposes to fix hours and pay on arbitrary hard and fast lines for all industries. Precisely so. And do not the Board of Conciliation and Arbitration Court do precisely the same thing ? Where ia the difference ? In its ezoeßß of feeling, the Star lets out several unpalatable truths which it has hitherto, in its slavißb advooaoy of th e Government cause, striven hard to conoeal. Here is one interesting admission : 'It is notorious that the boot-making trade is in a stagnant and perilous condition. Notwithstanding a 22$ per oent. tariff, the importation of boots, especially from America, has inoreased considerably, and a very small increase in cost of produotion would lead to further importations and loss of employment to many workmen. What has been stated of this industry is true of all others. The conditions affeoting their working should only be changed after careful investigation.' True, oh Star\ But why, in the interest of the worker*, has this manifest truth been bo delayed? We are destroying our manufacturing industries by our arbitrary and vexatious Labour legislation, and the startling truth ia being withheld from the workers by that section of the press whioh professes an advooacy of their cause. la the Star itself not grossly culpable in this matter ?