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 But those who once would have nothing but conciliation would now have nothing but arbitration. In the face of almost frantic appeals from friends of conciliation in the chamber, the amendment was passed, and the Bill was sent back to the House of Representatives. It was then that Mr. Seddon found expression for his feelings.

“It is not for me,” he declared bitterly, “to attribute motives, or to say anything disrespectful of those who have practically abolished the Boards, taking upon themselves this grave responsibility. But I have asked myself: Is it a means to an end? Is there a desire to do away with conciliation and to force us to have nothing but the Court, with a view to ultimately repealing this labour legislation? Time alone will solve that problem. I do not say that those who differ from me on this point are wrong; but the departure is of a very serious nature, and if a conflict is provoked by forcing parties to the Court, the responsibility must be upon other shoulders, not upon mine, or upon the shoulders of those who represent labour in this Parliament. The only reason given for this important change is that there have been shortcomings in the administration of this part of the law. It is not a good reason, it is not sufficient.”

It was not very long before the usefulness of the Boards, in one respect at least, was clearly demonstrated. The Court immediately became congested with a mass of business with which it could not deal. It travelled from one end of the colony to the other. While it was away in the north, scores of cases awaited its attention in the south. Unionists cried out against it for not dealing with its business more expeditiously, and blame was heaped upon it for a dilatoriousness that it did not display.

The discovery was then made that the Boards had performed very important duties. It is impossible to set down the results of their work in figures. A statement of the number of recommendations they made, and the number of those recommendations that both sides accepted, would not give an adequate idea of what they accomplished. They dealt with masses of conflicting evidence, narrowed differences, swept away