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Docks blacking continues f c ro o m ntin pa u g e e d 26
Page 30
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shop stewards on a number of occasions and said: "You must not do this. The courts have made an order against it." The stewards refused, saying they were mandated by the men and they were going to do what the men wanted.
Mr Pain said the nub of the matter arose because the union had not taken disciplinary action against the shop stewards. The union believed that it would make matters worse if it disciplined the stewards.
The Industrial Court had tended to confuse the political and judicial approach, said Mr Pain. There were occasions when it seemed to be interpreting the Act in such a way as to seek to impose what the court considered would be good industrial relations.
"One does feel a little disturbed about the way things are going," he said. "It might lead to the court's attitude to industrial relations, and how they operated, overbearing the strict legal analysis to which these particular problems, particularly problems of contempt, should be subjected."
Lord Justice Buckley commented that of the five judges in the industrial court one was a professional judge.
Mr Pain replied that it did seem at times that the judicial approach was overborne by the industrial relations experience of the non-professional judges.
Mr Pain told the Court that, in the Panalpina case, the NIRC had held that the union was guilty of an unfair industrial practice because it induced a breach of contract in furtherance or contemplation of an industrial dispute. That was the position unless the union was registered. Remarked Lord Denning, Master of the Rolls: "If it is registered the union can do it. It is a penalty for not registering?"
Mr Pain agreed that if the unions were registered they would be protected from proceedings by section 96. The policy of the Act was to drive unions into registration by depriving them of the protection of the 1906 Trade Disputes Act.
When the hearing was resumed on Wednesday, two further appeals were joined against the Industrial Court's decision that the union was liable to Heatons and Craddock for an unfair industrial practice in causing the firms to be in breach of their contracts with customers.
Mr Pain said the Appeal Court was being asked to make a decision which would affect the whole trade union movement.
The question was whether shop stewards acted as "agents" of a union so as to make the union responsible for their activities in industrial dispute.
Mr Pain suggested that the 21-day adjournment of contempt of court charges against the union — ordered by the Industrial Court on May 12 — should be extended.
Mr Pain said: "I understand the Industrial Court has indicated it is not prepared to grant a further adjournment, I am apprehensive that the Court must start asking questions about what has been done in the meantime. Quite a lot has been done, but you will be getting hearings both here and there, and the pressure will become impossible."
Later, Lord Denning said the Appeal Court would consider the adjournment and give a ruling on the next day.