conditions of industry are dealt with by collective agreements between organisations of employers and of workpeople and/or by the joint machinery which has been set up in all the larger industries and sections of industry by such organisations.
Sections IV and V of this memorandum deal with collective agreements and joint negotiating machinery in greater detail.
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IV.
COLLECTIVE AGREEMENTS.
(a) General.
As previously indicated the wages and conditions of a large proportion of the workpeople in Great Britain are based on the terms of voluntary agree- ments reached by direct negotiations between the organisations of employers and of workers, or the various types of joint negotiating machinery established by such organisations.
No legislative measures are in force requiring the registration of collec- tive agreements, but arrangements are in existence whereby copies of the majority of such agreements are voluntarily supplied to the Ministry of Labour and National Service for record purposes.
In some cases
While the agreements are primarily concerned with settling the rates of wages and hours of work in the respective industries, some of them contain large numbers of working rules which regulate in the most precise and detailed manner the conditions under which the work is to be performed. Indeed, it may be said that the various agreements touch at some point or another almost every phase of the industrial life of the workers concerned. the agreements are the result of ad hoc negotiation between Federations, Associations or groups of employers, and the similar bodies representing the workpeople, and in others have been made by standing joint bodies representing employers and workpeople. Even in industries in which national agreements define conditions of employment with great precision, district or local agree- ments frequently exist side by side with them. In order that conflict may be avoided between the terms of the national and other agreements it is usual for the district and local agreements to bear some definite relationship to the national agreement, and this is often effected by the national agreement placing some definite restriction on the subjects with which the district or local agreements may deal, or on the manner in which they may deal with such subjects.
Very comprehensive information regarding collective agreements in certain industries, namely, mining and quarrying, engineering and shipbuilding, the manufacture of iron and steel and other metals, building, and woodworking, is contained in a "Report on Collective Agreements between Employers and Work- people" published by the Ministry of Labour in 1934. This Report shows very clearly the intricate and comprehensive character of the agreements which have been developed in various industries by voluntary methods over a long period of time.
(b) Provisions for the prevention of disputes made by joint negotiating
machinery and in collective agreements.
Many collective agreements, and also the rules of some of the joint negotiating bodies, set out in detail arrangements for dealing with industrial disputes.
The normal practice is for shop, local and district disputes to be referred by stages to a central authority within the industry, and it may be said that disputes are generally capable of settlement by trade machinery without need for resort to the arbitration of an outside authority.
Where the dispute machinery includes provision for arbitration arrange- ments these do not come into operation until the conciliation machinery has failed to settle a difference, and in many cases the arbitrator or umpire does not act independently but in association with the conciliation machinery. As a result of the effective operation of agreed dispute procedure it is the exception for disputes to be referred to an independent arbitration tribunal
8.
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