An important Memorandum was issued by the Board of Trade
on Tuesday forecasting the establishment of a new Arbitration Court for the settlement of industrial disputes. The Court will consist of either three or five members chosen from three previously selected panels. The first panel will consist of chairmen,—"persons of eminence and impartiality"; the second of employers; and the third of employees. The second and third panels will contain enough members to afford every likelihood of impartial minds being always avail- able. If necessary, the Court will be aided by assessors from the Board of Trade, who will explain technical matters. No special legislation is necessary for bringing the Court into existence. The proposal is, to our mind, perfectly legitimate, and the Court might be very useful indeed. It will be only an enlargement of the principle which now allows parties to a dispute to call in single Board of Trade nominees to arbitrate; and the services of the Court will not -be available unless both sides agree in asking for them. We hope that there will be complete confidence in their impartiality. The one thing to be resolutely avoided is the compulsory control of industrial disputes by the State. We have seen the results of such intervention in New Zealand, and the lesson, it is satisfactory to know, has not been lost on the Trade-Union Congress, which last week rejected the idea of introducing compulsion in Britain by a majority nearly as large as that by which it rejected it the year before.
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