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machinery, conditions of maritime employment, social insurance, forced labour, protection against accidents, workers* compensation, minimum age for employment, and the right of association. Before a convention may be ratified by New Zealand appropriate legislation must be enacted and administrative action taken in order to ensure that the convention is fulfilled..

5. Political Treaties Because it was considered necessary to maintain the diplomatic unity of the Commonwealth in such matters as declarations of war and peace, recognition of foreign Governments and the conclusion of treaties of peace; because of adherence to the juristic conception of the indivisibility of the British Crown; and, fundamentally, because the United Kingdom carried almost alone the burden of Imperial defence, United Kingdom control over the negotiation of political treaties continued long after the Dominions had established the right to negotiate independent commercial and technical agreements. The Imperial Conference of 1911 recorded its opinion that the authority of the Imperial (i.e., United Kingdom) Government " in such grave matters as the conduct of foreign policy, the conclusion of treaties, the declaration and maintenance of peace, or the declaration of war and, indeed, all those relations with foreign Powers, necessarily of the most delicate character, which are now in the hands of the Imperial Government, subject to its responsibility to the Imperial Parliament . . . cannot be shared." The United Kingdom was thus the principal political negotiator on behalf of the Empire until the Treaty of Versailles of 1919The Treaty of Versailles marks a transitional stage; the two forms used for the Preamble and the form used in the Covenant of the League of Nations show this transition. In the Preamble the Dominions are not separately mentioned among the Allied and Associated Powers, being included in " The British Empire," which was named among the Principal Allied and Associated Powers. Nevertheless, in recognition of the contributions of the Dominions to victory, their representatives were included among the plenipotentiaries for the British Empire, the Preamble goes on to list the British Empire plenipotentiaries in this way, mentioning the Dominions separately (though they were not separate parties to the Treaty),.