other’s strength, and as one was afraid to fight and the other did not like to begin, there was a period of armed peace, which lasted until the Act was brought into use by mutual agreement, and the parties went first to the Conciliation Board for Canterbury and then to the Court. This dispute, the first of a long list settled by the Act, is interesting for several reasons.[1]
Statements were submitted to the Board by both sides. They are long and technical documents, and need not be dealt with here. The employers’ statement, in its first two clauses, claimed the right of the employers to employ any worker, whether he belonged to a union or not, and set forth that there should be no distinction between organised and non-organised labour, both to work under the same conditions and to receive equal pay for equal work.
The employers regarded this point as of greater importance than any other in the statement they submitted. “It is not right,” they said, “for the union to force its services upon us, any more than it would be right for an individual to walk into a shop and demand employment as a right. We submit that the employers invest their money in their businesses, and if the union’s demands are adopted, their capital will be at the mercy of the workmen. If the views of the union are to prevail in this case, they ought to be given effect to in every shop in which workmen are employed. We submit that no employer could carry on business under such conditions. He must be able to select his own workmen. If he is limited, he will risk his capital without being able to control the operations carried on by it. No man would be foolish enough to risk his capital under conditions of that sort. We also submit that the rule demanded by the union would be very unfair to the large body of men who do not belong to the union. Unions, we contend, exist for the benefit of those who belong to them, and not for the injury of those who do not. It would be very unjust to deprive a man of his employment because he does not wish to belong to a union. The ten manufacturers belonging to this Association employ 1174 persons; of these 535 are
- ↑ A verbatim report of the proceedings and of the circumstances that led up to the case, together with the recommendations and award, is given in a book, entitled “The Boot Trade Disputes,” by Mr. J. F. Arnold, M.H.R., published in Dunedin in 1897.
