But he made no mention of the lockout of the miners. He said the unions had campaigned against arbitration. Senator Arthur Rae had written a book, The Curse of Arbitration. The ARU had rejected arbitration. Yet, at other times, the government was attacking those against arbitration as red-raggers and extremists.
Then Latham gave the show away. He referred to the action of my government in passing the 44-Hour Week in 1926. He said that if the timber workers had been deregistered in the Federal Court they would have obtained a 44-hour week under a state award. The government was clearing the way for Mr Bavin to bring in a 48-hour week again in New South Wales.
At that time there were only 88 federal awards in force in NSW as against 455 state awards. Once the state government had sole control of industrial matters, Mr Bavin could impose whatever industrial conditions were wanted by the Nationalist Consultative Council.
Latham rejected a suggestion by Curtin that the men could elect their own representatives to the Industrial Boards for the maritime industries. Frank Brennan said the proposal was begotten out of a craven spirit by cynicism. Bruce had given the impression that he knew little or nothing about the subject, while Latham had given the impression that he knew all about it but wanted to keep it dark.
They had appointed their own judges at bigger and better salaries, with bigger pensions and tenure for life. Now there was to be a dismal procession of self-confessed failures going back on their tracks.
Labor members like Norman Makin, J.B. Chifley, George Martens and Ted Riley Sen, who had practised in the industrial courts as advocates, trotted out all the achievements of arbitration. They were more legal than the lawyers. They cited the Commonwealth Law Report. They talked about common rule, and gave forth with lengthy extracts from various judgments. It was almost as if they were being deprived of their professional status.
Bruce's chief defender from New South Wales was Archdale Parkhill, who had been Hughes' chief propagandist when the Nationalist Party was first formed. He later went into the federal Parliament as member for Warringah. He said that when he was speaking on one street corner in Mosman, Theodore had been on another supporting the AWU candidate. Parkhill said that Theodore had said: "Mr Lang must be disciplined ruthlessly, with the gloves off." An interjector had retorted, "Your number is up for Dalley," and Theodore had replied, "There will be no shrinking on my part." Yet, said Parkhill, a few months later Theodore was licking Lang's hand. Parkhill didn't like me. In that respect I was second only to Jock Garden in his hate list.
Then E.A. Mann, Nationalist member for Perth, entered the lists against Bruce. He started off delightfully by recalling Greek customs:
"A quaint local custom of one of the old Greek states was that anyone desiring to bring into the state a new law should appear before an assembly of the citizens to propound that law with a halter round his neck, so that should the law not meet with the approval of the assembly, or not be considered necessary for the requirements of the state, the halter might properly be used to strangle him."
W.M. Hughes: "Oh, that those days might come back again!"
Mann replied they had. If the House rejected the Bruce Bill, the government would be politically executed.
In his budget Page had opened with a note of cheerfulness, with what was the triumph of hope over experience. Next day the Prime Minister had reversed the picture. Yet Bruce had described people who had issued similar warnings as Jeremiahs and croaking pessimists. Now he was saying, "We are in a bad way. We can't carry on." Now he said the only way was to reduce the cost of production. By that he meant reducing wages. Mann said the government was helping the Communists, who also attacked arbitration.
Bert Lazzarini quoted an interview given by Bavin to the Sydney Morning Herald, which indicated that he also proposed to scrap the existing system of arbitration. He proposed to follow the Bruce model.
Then another prominent member of the Government side took the floor against the measure. He was G.A. Maxwell, K.C., member for the blue-ribbon Nationalist seat of Fawkner in Victoria. He said that Bruce had said that the Bill should be considered on non-party lines. He proposed to accept the invitation. He refused to be branded a rebel or a traitor. He proposed to exercise his own judgment on a matter of grave national importance. The government had no mandate. It was against the Nationalist Party program. The party had not been consulted. He refused to be bound by the Prime Minister's whim. His electors had returned him believing he supported arbitration. The first he knew of the volte face was the receipt of the Prime Minister's urgent telegram. He had reserved his opinion until he had heard the Prime Minister's defence. Having heard, he was satisfied that he had not made out a case. Instead of providing one supreme authority in industrial matters, the government was creating six –the state tribunals.
Maxwell was a brilliant lawyer. He dissected the measure. He exposed the weaknesses of the government's arguments. He described it as the negation of every principle for which the Prime Minister was supposed to stand. In particular, he stripped Latham's case of all its supports. He even had a dig at the moral and spiritual aspects of the matter. With regret, but without misgiving, he proposed to vote against the measure.
On Thursday, September 5, the debate was resumed in a sitting that was to last until 12.30pm on the following Saturday. For two days and nights the Bill was torn to shreds.
W.M. Hughes took up the attack. He said that it was without parallel in Commonwealth legislation. For 25 years they had advanced towards their goal. Every party had wanted more power. Now the Bruce government had sounded the trumpet for a general and shameful retreat. The temple of industrial arbitration was to be torn down. Not one stone was to be left standing. Bruce's speech was full of sophisms, irrelevancies and platitudes. Latham had made a pretence of logic but had followed his leader. After being in recess for six months, the government now said they had to day and night to get the bill through. Delay would be fatal. Had some at financial cataclysm occurred?
Bruce had accepted a portfolio in his ministry knowing that arbitration was part of its policy. When Bruce became Prime Minister he took the policy with him. He had gone to the people for a mandate to enforce the industrial law. He had obtained his mandate. Now he said that compulsory arbitration was wrong, penalties were barbarous and all courts and tribunals must go. Yesterday he was the protagonist of penalties. Today he preaches the gospel brotherly love. The parties are to turn the other cheek, penalties are to be kept away. The system is as it was 10 years ago. It is the Prime Minister who has changed. He says he believes in a high standard of living, but the cost of production must come down. So he proposes to abolish the courts that have been the guardians of the economic and industrial welfare of the people and the only barrier between them and chaos.
"What would happen if the parties didn't agree?" asked Hughes. The framers of the constitution had placed arbitration in the constitution just after the greatest industrial conflagration the country had ever seen, and while its embers were still warm. Those men had seen the "print of the nails," they had thrust their fingers into the wound. He was reminded of the limerick:
There was a young lady of Riga
Who went for a ride on the tiger
They came back from the ride
With the lady inside
And a smile on the face of the tiger
That would be the position of the workers. If the price of meat came down would not the graziers suffer? If the price of bread was reduced, would not the farmers get less for their wheat? Mercilessly Hughes stripped Bruce down to his very spats. Bruce was a dilettante, said Hughes. He had made one attempt to amend the constitution but had walked out leaving the job to Latham. He had been recreant to his trust. He had betrayed the people. He had insulted their intelligence. He had affronted their sense of decency. "He is the creature of a day. What he does today, another can undo tomorrow." The Bill was an attempt to save his face so that he would not be eternally confronted with the ghost of the hideous blunder he had made when he had withdrawn the prosecution of John Brown.
Frank Anstey quickly tangled with his old adversary, Dr Page. He said that the treasurer had lifted the debate to the lofty eminence of the sewer. "Far better it is to be ignorant than to be cultured, educated, talented and to sell one's talents for the first mess of pottage that offers," said Anstey, attacking Hughes' former colleagues in the ministry who had betrayed him for Bruce.
P.G. Stewart was another to declare himself against his former leader. He said while the mines were still closed, the women were starving, John Brown still could be seen at Randwick with his field glasses slung over his shoulder.
Hughes: "John Brown's body lies a-moulderin' is the grave but his soul goes marching on."
Stewart said members of the government had referred to trade unions as "basher gangs", "a seething mass of maggots", "running sores", and "fangless snakes." He would leave them with such nauseous expressions. He would oppose the Bill.
Bruce, in reply, showed how deeply he had been nettled by Hughes. He referred to his "sinister suggestions, poisonous and offensive charges". At one stage in Bruce's reply, Hughes interjected "Hear, hear." The Speaker called him to order. Hughes naively wanted to know how he had offended. He was told that it was the tone in which he had uttered it that was offensive. Billy repeated "Hear, hear." Bruce admitted it was contrary to his party's platform with Hughes interjecting. "L'etat, c'est moi." Bruce again repeated that the depression was not temporary and was due to a fundamental defect.
The second reading passed by 34 to 30 with W.M. Hughes, E.A. Mann, G.A. Maxwell and P.G. Stewart voting with the opposition.
But the fight was not yet over. When the Parliament adjourned on Saturday afternoon, it still had no idea of the events ahead.
At the weekend members returned to their homes believing that the crisis was just about over. But Bruce was still very worried. He fully realised that the fight was entering the critical round.
Although arbitration was the issue before Parliament, outside there was raging a new political tornado. In the Parliament it was kept severely in the background. But in every city and in every bush town the people were experiencing the full impact of the best organised political pressure campaign in the history of the Commonwealth.
The movie interests had declared war on the Bruce government. The talkie age had just arrived. Like their own product the movie people had switched from the old silents to full-blast talkies on the political front. But the bad men were not the villains of the Hollywood sets. They were in Canberra.
Stanley Melbourne Bruce and Dr. Earle Page were being depicted as trying to foreclose on the mortgage of the old movie homestead. They were trying to rob the poor widows and orphans of the movie moguls. They were the vampires sucking the blood out of the innocent film distributors' bodies. It all arose out of a very small mention in Dr Page's Budget speech. After explaining that there was a heavy Commonwealth deficit, he announced that the Government had decided to increase taxes. Income tax was to be increased by £10 millions. In addition it was proposed to levy an Amusements Tax.
Page proposed a tax of 5 per cent., or 1/- in the pound, on the total receipts for admissions to all entertainments. "This tax will be a levy upon a national luxury, which, it is considered should make a special contribution in the present circumstances." In those days it was still possible to obtain admission to a film theatre for a shilling. To suggest that those indulging themselves to that extent were plunging into wanton extravagance was hardly good politics.
Page said the government expected to raise £600,000 from the tax. He pointed out that attendances at amusements had risen from 78 millions in 1922 to 126 millions in 1928. What he overlooked was that they mostly had votes. To make matters worse, the government announced an extra duty of a penny per foot on all foreign cinema films imported into Australia. The film interests immediately got busy. They abandoned political neutrality. They decided to go after Bruce and Page. The campaign was organised by the Motion Picture Distributors' Association. Its president was Sir Victor Wilson. He had been minister for markets and migration in the Bruce-Page government from 1923-26. He had been close to Bruce. Now he was the general in charge of the forces uniting to defeat him.
Petitions against the Amusement Tax were signed in every theatre in the Commonwealth. Members were bombarded with telegrams. Employees were told theatres would have to close. Builders were informed there would be no new theatres built. Shareholders in film companies were told that they` would lose their dividends because the industry could not stand the strain. The member for Angas, Mr Parsons, read to the House a telegram he had received:
Your persistent silence suggests that you deliberately ignore vested interests whose life and livelihood is at stake. Unless intimation received your return immediately, our representative leaves by plane to demand you take action.
Jepson, Secretary, United Amusement Interests.
All the weekend there were feverish discussions. Every member was lobbied. The Labor Party realised that it was getting unexpected allies. It didn't hesitate to give the necessary pledges not to go ahead with the Amusements Tax. The idea of having all the resources of the movie people to call upon appealed greatly to Theodore.
In order to upset the government it was necessary to get three more votes, in addition to those who had voted against the government on the second reading.
Hughes was carrying the keg of dynamite. He had the time fuse all ready. Nothing gave him more satisfaction than this chance to get even with his two greatest enemies. He knew that Mann, and P.G. Stewart would do anything to assist him. They hated as much as he hated.
George Maxwell K.C. had already indicated that he was against the Prime Minister on grounds of principle, because it was a volte face on party policy. W.J. McWilliams, the Nationalist member for Franklin, had also indicated that he was against the bill being rushed through, and saw in it some kind of threat to Tasmania.
That made up two votes. Another was necessary. Where was it coming from? That was the big question canvassed over the weekend. There were all kinds of wild rumors. Bruce said that if there was any delay in implementing the proposal, he would go to the country.
Hughes threw down the challenge as soon as the House resumed consideration of the Bill in committee on the Tuesday. He moved an amendment that it should not be proclaimed until it had been submitted to the people either at a referendum or a general election.
Again he thrashed Bruce with violating his own platform. He said Bruce had concealed his intention from the people. He had promised that they would soon round Cape Desolation and proceed into the Bay of Plenty. Instead he had put the helm hard over and reversed course saying: "Unless you stand behind me in this, you will walk the plank. Unless you tear up your election pledges, I will excommunicate you."
Hughes accepted the election offer. "It will be the end of the government and honorable members who support it," predicted Hughes "The verdict will make it impossible for any political thimble-rigger further to cloud the issue ... Let us go before the people and fight this battle once and for all." Bruce took up the challenge. He denied that he had invited his followers to "walk the plank". Many of them had voted against government measures. But Hughes and Mann had impugned the honesty and decency of the government on the John Brown issue. That was why they had been expelled. That was why they had "walked the plank".
Bruce rejected the idea of another referendum. It was not constitutionally possible. He said that if Hughes' amendment were carried the government would go to the people. He was confident that he would again win. Bruce's announcement caused a tumultuous scene. There were cheers and counter cheers from both sides. Members were rocked by the shock.
J.H. Scullin, who had returned from a sick bed for the climax, said the government was somersaulting on its own policy. It was trying to load the court against the workers. He said the Prime Minister reminded him of a regimental sergeant-major marching his recruits around a drill hall. "The Prime Minister says, `Quick march!' They march. The Prime Minister says, `Halt, right about face, quick march.' They march back. They are the political awkward squad."