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 ARBITRATION

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CONCILIATION

degree of permanent success was that established for the hosiery and glove trade in Nottingham in 1860, through the efforts of Mr Mundella. In 1864 a board was established in the Wolverhampton building trades, with Mr (afterwards Sir) Rupert Kettle as chairman, and in 1868 boards were formed for the pottery trade, the Leicester hosiery trade, and the Nottingham lace trade. Of the above boards only the last-named is still actively in existence, though a joint committee still exists for settling minor questions in the pottery trade. In 1869, however, there was formed one of the most important of the still existing boards, viz., the board of arbitration and conciliation in the manufactured iron and steel trades of the north of England, with which the names of Rupert Kettle, David Dale, and others are associated. In 1872 joint committees were formed in the Durham and Northumberland coal trades to deal with local questions. The Leicester boot and shoe trade board, the first of an elaborate system of local boards in this trade, was founded in 1875. From about 1870 onwards there was a great movement for the establishment of “ sliding scales ” in the coal and iron and steel trades, which by regulating wages automatically rendered unnecessary the settlement of general wages by conciliation or arbitration. These sliding scales, however, usually had attached to them joint committees for dealing with disputed questions. A sliding scale arranged by Mr (since Sir) David Dale was attached to the manufactured iron trade board in 1871. A sliding scale for the Cleveland blast furnacemen came into force in 1879. Sliding scales were also adopted in the coal trade in many districts, South Wales (1875), Durham (1877), and Northumberland (1879). The movement was, however, followed by a reaction, and several of the sliding scales in the coal trade were terminated between 1887 and 1889. The formation on a large scale of conciliation boards in the coal trade to fix the rate of wages dates from the great miners’ dispute of 1893, one of the terms of settlement agreed to at the conference held at the Foreign Office under Lord Rosebery being the formation of a conciliation board covering the districts affected. Northumberland followed in 1894, Durham in 1895, Scotland in 1900. The first general district board to be formed was that established in London in 1890, through the London Chamber of Commerce, as a sequel to the Mansion House committee which mediated in the great London dock strike of 1889. The example has been followed by several large towns, but the action taken by the boards in some of these provincial districts has been very limited. The most typical form of machinery for the settlement of disputes by voluntary conciliation is a joint board consisting of equal numbers of representatives of Constitution and employers and employed. The members of the functions board are usually elected by the associations of of volun- employers and workmen, though in some cases tary con- (e.y., in the manufactured iron trade board) the ciliation workmen’s representatives are elected not by boards. their trade union but by meetings of workmen employed at the various works. The chairman may be an independent person, or, more usually, a representative of the employers, the vice-chairman being a representative of the workmen. In the arbitration and conciliation boards in the boot and shoe trade, provision is made by which the chair may be occupied by representatives of the employers and workmen in alternate years. An independent chairman usually has a casting vote, which practically makes him an umpire in case of equal voting, but where there is no outside chairman there is usually provision for reference of cases on which the board cannot agree to an umpire, who may either be a permanent officer of the board elected for a period of time (as in the case of several of the boards

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in the boot and shoe trade), or selected ad hoc by the board or appointed by some outside person or body. Thus the choice of the permanent chairman or umpire of the miners’ conciliation board, formed in pursuance of the settlement of the coal dispute of 1893 by Lord Rosebery, was left to the Speaker of the House of Commons. Since the passing of the Conciliation Act, several conciliation boards have provided in their rules for the appointment of umpires by the Board of Trade. Conciliation boards constituted as described above usually have rules providing that there shall always be equality of voting as between employer and workmen, in spite of the casual absence of individuals on one side or the other. In order to expedite business it is sometimes provided that all questions shall be first considered by a sub-committee, with power to settle them by agreement before coming before the full board. Boards of conciliation and arbitration conforming more or less to the above type exist in the coal, iron and steel, boot and shoe, and other industries in the United Kingdom. A somewhat different form of organization has prevailed in the cottonspinning trade (since the dispute of 1892-93) and in the engineering trade (since the engineering dispute of 1897-98). In these important industries there are no permanent boards for the settlement of general questions, but elaborate agreements are in force between the employers’ and workmen’s organizations which among other things prescribe the mode in which questions at issue shall be dealt with and if possible settled. In the first place, if the question cannot be settled between the employer and his workmen, it is dealt with by the local associations or committees or their officials, and failing a settlement in this manner, is referred to a joint meeting of the executive committees of the two associations. In neither agreement is there any provision for the ultimate decision of unsettled questions by arbitration. The agreement in the cotton trade is known as the “ Brooklands Agreement,” and a large number of questions have been amicably settled under its provisions. In the building trade, in which (with the exception of the plumbers’ board) there are at present no national arrangements for conciliation and arbitration, it is very customary for the local “ working rules,” agreed to mutually by employers and employed in particular districts, to contain “ conciliation rules ” providing for the reference of disputed questions to a joint committee with or without an ultimate reference to arbitration. Yet another form of voluntary board is the “ district board,” consisting in most cases of representatives elected in equal numbers by the local chamber of commerce and trades council respectively. In the case, however, of the London Conciliation Board the workmen’s representatives are elected, twelve by specially summoned meetings of trade union delegates and two by co-optation. The functions of district boards are to deal with disputes in any trade which may occur within their districts, and of course they can only take action with the consent of both parties to the dispute, in this respect differing from the majority of “trade” boards, which, as a rule, are empowered by the agreement under which they are constituted to deal with questions on the application of either party. Another interesting type of board is that representing two or more groups of workmen and sometimes their employers, with the object of settling “ demarcation ” disputes between the groups of workmen (i.e., questions as to the limits of the work which each group may claim to perform). Examples of such boards are those representing shipwrights and joiners on the Clyde, Tyne, and elsewhere. While the arrangements for voluntary conciliation and arbitration differ in this way in various industries, there is an equally wide