Victorian Wages Boards: Their Origins and the Doctrine of the Living Wage

The "Harvester Equivalent" used in this article means that monetary amount which at different times and in parts of Australia was needed to buy the same "bundle of goods" and services which 42/- a week could buy in Melbourne in November 1907.

P.G. Macarthy , The Harvester Judgment—an Historical Assessment, Ph.D. thesis, Australian National University, 1967, Chapter 5.

Ibid., pp. 291-2.

Q. 2028.

Melbourne Trades Hall Council Minutes, November 4, 1891.

See below.

Macarthy, op. cit., pp. 321-5.

For details of the "Statement" see The Royal Commission on Strikes, 1891, Literary Appendix, L.7.

T.H.C. Minutes, June 22, 1894.

Ibid.

T.H.C. Minutes, May 31, 1895.

Macarthy, op. cit., Appendix 4.

For example, M.T. Rankin , Arbitration and Conciliation in Australia , London, 1916, p. 14.

J. Philipp , Trade Union Organisation in New South Wales and Victoria, 1870-1890, M.A. thesis, University of Melbourne, 1954, pp. 170-1.

T.H.C. Minutes, September 7, 1894, settlement of the bootmakers' dispute.

Ibid., August 8, 1890; see also J. Hutson, Penal Settlement to Penal Power, Sydney, 1966, p. 27; and T. Matthews, "The Political Activities of Employers' Federations in Australia", Australian Political Studies Association 1964 Conference, Canberra, p. 1, for accounts of pre-1890s functions of this board.

T.H.C. Minutes, August 8, 1890.

Ibid., February 12, 1891.

Ibid., March 18, 1892, and April 8, 1892.

Ibid., June 10, 1892.

Ibid., July 8, 1892.

Ibid., August 5, 1892.

Ibid., October 21, 1892.

Ibid., October 27, 1893.

Ibid., December 1, 1893.

Ibid., November 16, 1894.

For the miners' support for compulsory arbitration see Amalgamated Miners' Association of Victoria, Annual Conference Report, 1897, p. 17; 1898, p. 15; 1900, p. 10; 1901, p. 54; 1902, p. 20; 1903, p. 59; and Worker, November 9, 1905. For the Australian Labour Federation, see T.H.C. Minutes, June 8, 1894. For the Shearers' Union, see Pastoralists' Review, Vol. 4, 1894, pp. 207, 369, and Tocsin, March 17, 1898.

T.H.C. Minutes, December 18, 1897.

Ibid.

Vic. Parl. Debates, Session 1900, Vol. 94, p. 1002.

T.H.C. Minutes, August 25, 1900.

Vic. Parl. Debates, Session 1900, Vol. 95, pp. 1370-1.

Vic. Parl. Debates, Vol. 97, 1901, pp. 273, 3219; Vol. 100, 1902, p. 552; Vol. 103, 1903, p. 2852; Vol. 105, 1903, p. 35; Vol. 106, 1903, p. 2100; Vol. 107, 1904, p. 83; Vol. 109, 1904, p. 3331; Vol. 110, 1905, p. 330; Vol. 112, 1905, p. 3551. For the T.H.C.'s continuing pressure for compulsory conciliation and arbitration see T.H.C. Minutes, November 30, 1900; December 7, 1900; December 21, 1900; February 22, 1901; September 29, 1901; December 6, 1901; July 3, 1903; August 21, 1903; August 28, 1903; March 31, 1904. Tocsin, December 13, 1900; December 27, 1900; August 20, 1902; August 13, 1903.

I. Campbell , Politics, Parties, and Pressure Groups in Australia (1900-1905), M.A. thesis, University of Sydney, 1958, p. 50; see also various references in F.H. Cutler , History of the Anti-Sweating Movement in Victoria, 1873-1896, M.A. thesis, University of Melbourne, 1956.

See numerous references to contacts, discussions, conferences, joint deputations mentioned in T.H.C. Minutes, especially from the mid-late 1890s. For T.H.C./ A.S.L. co-operation see Cutler, op. cit., especially pp. 92, 101-2, 116, 135. A.N.A. support for the minimum wage clause is evidenced by the order that only trade union minimum wage-paying employers should be patronized for the printing required by the Association, Tocsin, October 6, 1898.

T.H.C. Minutes, January 18, 1901.

Ibid., October 18, 1895.

Vic. Parl. Debates, Session 1895-6, Vol. 78, p. 3144.

Ibid., p. 3145.

Ibid., Vol. 79, p. 3149.

Cutler, op. cit., p. 102.

Vic. Parl. Debates, Vol. 79, p. 3150.

Bulletin, October 6, 1900.

R. Gollan , Radical and Working Class Politics—A Study of Eastern Australia, 1860-1910 , Melbourne, 1960, pp. 187-8.

Tocsin, September 22, 1898; also T.H.C. Minutes, January 14, 1898; January 28, 1898; February 11, 1898; February 18, 1898; March 11, 1898.

For example, October 25, 1898; October 6, 1899.

Ibid., October 17, 1899.

Bulletin, September 8, 1900; October 6, 1900.

For example, Vic. Parl. Debates, Session 1900, Vol. 94, p. 998.

T.H.C. Minutes, May 9, 1902; May 15, 1902; October 24, 1902.

M. Rankin, op. cit., pp. 15-16.

Worker, June 23, 1910; August 8, 1912; see also evidence given at N.S.W. Royal Commission, 1913, p. 507. The interpretation given here differs from Rankin's (op. cit.), who believed the removal of the apprenticeship stipulation in 1903 was the reason for the lower yearly average of new boards set up in 1903-1910. She disregards the many boards set up in 1906-7 although the apprenticeship rule was not reapplied until 1910. Moreover, a great many of the trade unions seeking boards were those representing occupational groups where apprenticeship mostly did not apply—that is, some manufacturing industries and many services. A study of T.H.C. Minutes and Labor newspapers leaves little room to doubt that very many occupational groups would have been brought into the system if they could have so persuaded the legislators.

Rankin, op. cit., p. 17.

Ibid., p. 18.

Ibid.

Macarthy, op. cit., pp. 320-1.

Letter from Chief Secretary's Office, June 9, 1965.

Victorian Government Gazettes or Reports of the Chief Inspector of Factories and Shops published yearly in Vic. Parl. Papers.

Macarthy, op. cit., pp. 229-30.

P.S. Collier , Minimum Wage Legislation in Australia, Ph.D. thesis, Columbia University, 1915, reproduced in the Fourth Annual Report of the New York State Factory Investigating Commission, Vol. IV, p. 1855.

For example, P.H. Douglas , Wages and the Family, Chicago , 1925, p. 151. For evidence of wages board chairmen presiding over collective bargaining procedures see Vic. Royal Commission 1902-3, pp. 326, 432, 438, 456, 477, 607-8, 623, 648.

N.S.W. Royal Commission, 1913, p. 206; also Worker, April 17, 1913.

Rankin, op. cit., pp. 18-9.

Collier, op. cit., p. 1861.

Report of the Chief Inspector of Factories, Workrooms and Shops for 1908, p. 36.

Ibid.

Macarthy, op. cit., pp. 285-9.

Rankin, op. cit., p. 17.

Acts of Parl. of Victoria, 1903, 1857 Section 14.

Report of the Chief Inspector of Factories and Shops for 1915, p. 149.

Act of Parliament, 1903, op. cit.

Ibid., Section 16.

Chief Inspector's Report for 1908, p. 52.

Worker, June 20, 1907.

Ibid., for an earlier report, June 6, 1907.

After 1905 the Victorian Court was sui generis. There seems to have been no special appointment, Judges of the Supreme Court taking particular cases as they occurred; hence Justices a'Beckett, Hood, Hodges and Cussen each in turn presided.

Chief Inspector's Report for 1908, p. 17; see also T.H.C. Minutes, October 21, 1904.

September 19, 1907.

Oct. 1904, Artificial Manure; Sept. 1906, Fellmongers; Aug. 1907, Bread Trade; June 1909, Fellmongers; Sept. 1909, Artificial Manure; Nov. 1909, Hairdressers; Dec. 1909, Ice Trade; July 1912, Boilermakers; June 1913, Fuel and Fodder; June 1913, Artificial Manure; April 1914, Confectioners; April 1914, Stone Cutters; Aug. 1914, Clerks; Aug. 1915, Builders' Labourers. Taken from the Report of the Chief Inspector for 1915, Appendix E.

1906 and 1913.

T.H.C. Minutes, October 21, 1904; November 11, 1904; April 26, 1907. Argus, August 22, 1906, report of trade union deputation to the Chief Secretary to abolish the R.E.C.

Argus, September 5, 1906, giving report of Victorian Employers' Federation deputation to the Chief Secretary.

Supra, p. 126.

Macarthy, op. cit., Chapter 4.

For changes in both the scope and geographical coverage consult the Chief Inspector's Reports for the years 1907 to 1921, especially Appendix B.

Macarthy, op. cit., pp. 170-4.

J.E. Isaac , Economic Analysis of Wage Regulation in Australia: 1920-1947, Ph.D. thesis, University of London, 1949, pp. 24-5.

Macarthy, op. cit., p. 173.

Worker, August 13, 1908.

Supra, p. 126.

Worker, May 27, 1909.

Ibid.

Argus, January 3, 1910; also Argus Law Reports, Vol. XV, p. 233.

Argus Law Reports, Vol. XV, 1909, p. 227; see Vol. XVI, p. 47, Judge Hodges agreeing with Hood and a Beckett that the Court was not an instrument of social reform.

Argus, August 17, 1912.

Ibid.

See, for example, Argus, July 30, 1913, September 30, 1913; and Argus Law Reports, Vol. XV, p. 229, and Vol. XVI, pp. 47-8, Vol. XVIII, p. 402.

Worker, January 31, 1912.