How ordinary Appointed by | Nominated by min- | By employers and members are ap- minister on rec- employees, respec- industrial court. ister; but if one- Appeal against de- To industrial court Issuspension of decision possible pending appeal. against decision of boards. No; except by temporary variation of award by the court. To the court of industrial appeals. Yes; for not more than 12 months. Can preference to unionists be declared. Yes. workers, respectively. By governor in | President appointed by governor general from justices of high court for a term of 7 years. public health. By inspectors of fac- By factories depart- By arbitration By department of tories and shops, department of labor. No.. No.. No.. By proceedings instituted by registrar, or by any organization affected, or a member thereof. No appeal except To supreme court. No appeal; case may XII. OPERATION OF AUSTRALASIAN LEGISLATION. The following tables set forth the industrial disputes which have occurred in Australia, the number of wage earners involved, and the estimated losses in working days and wages during the years 1913 and 1914:1 Industrial disputes in the Commonwealth, classified according to industrial groups, 1913 and 1914. Industrial disputes in each State and Territory-Comparative particulars for 1 Official Yearbooks of the Commonwealths of Australia and New Zealand. 3,286 350 552 987 1,400 2,500 Boards authorized and constituted, awards, determinations, and agreements in 1 Excluding special demarcation boards. In New South Wales 21 boards were dissolved owing to alterations in the sectional arrangement of industries and callings. In Victoria 1 board was superseded by 3 boards. In Queensland, authorization for 1 board was subsequently rescinded. In addition, 5 awards and determinations had been made, but had not come into operation on the 31st of December, 1914. Of that number 4 were in Queensland (including 2 which were suspended pending the hearing of appeals), and 1 in Victoria. The figures are exclusive of awards and determinations which had expired by effluxion of time, and had not been renewed on the 31st of December, 1914. 4 Including 1 award made by the industrial court under section 7 of the industrial peace act, 1912, for an industry not under an industrial board. 5 Including 7 awards made by the industrial court. 6 Including an industrial agreement declared by the industrial court, under section 40 of the industrial Of 337 disputes in 1914 only 29 were settled by the machinery of State or Federal industrial acts. A majority were by private negotiation. Wage earners lost £850,000 through strikes during 1914 and 1915, according to the Commonwealth statistician. In 1915, according to the report of the secretary of labor, New Zealand had one woolen-mill strike, involving 233 operatives, and six strikes of steamship and wharf labor. OPERATION OF THE NEW ZEALAND LAW.1 The following statement shows in a summary form the cases which came before the arbitration court and conciliation councils of New Zealand during the fiscal year ended March 31, 1915: Industrial agreements-- Recommendations of conciliation councils_. Awards of arbitration court_ Enforcement of awards (cases conducted by labor department) A total of 330 cases for the enforcement of awards were also brought before magistrates during the same fiscal year. For the same year the number of industrial disputes brought to the attention of the conciliation commissioners was 101. Of this number 61 were settled by mutual agreement, 23 were partly adjusted, and 17 were wholly referred to the court of arbitration. These facts are set forth in tabular form below: Industrial disputes dealt with by conciliation commissioners and councils during the year ended Mar. 31, 1915. As to strikes, the following is a summary of strikes in New Zealand from the inception of the industrial conciliation and arbitration act (1894) to March 31, 1915: Number of strikes coming within scope of the act_ 95 Total number of strikes___ 2148 Number of disputes included in total which may be classed as trivial or unimportant 52 Average duration of all strikes (trivial cases not included) (days). 32 17, 317 £1, 933 Total amount collected to date----- £1, 549 Only five lockouts have occurred since the New Zealand legislation was put into operation. 1 The data as to the operation of the New Zealand laws have been compiled from the New Zealand Year Book for 1915 and preceding years. 2 Of this total, 31 strikes were of slaughtermen, consisting of two separate sympathetic disputes, one in 1906-7 and the other in 1912-13, spread over practically the whole of the Dominion. Six were within the scope of the act and 25 outside it. In three other cases the employers were not involved. |