R v Commonwealth Conciliation and Arbitration Commission; Ex parte Melbourne and Metropolitan Tramways Board [1966] HCA 32

High Court of Australia Barwick C.J. McTiernan, Taylor, Menzies and Owen JJ. R v Commonwealth Conciliation and Arbitration Commission; Ex parte Melbourne and Metropolitan Tramways Board [1966] HCA 32

ORDER Order that the order nisi for prohibition made herein the 15th day of April 1966 be made absolute and the respondents and each of them prohibited from further proceeding with or upon the Australian Tramway and Omnibus Interim Award, 1966. Order that the respondent, The Australian Tramway and Motor Omnibus Employees' Association, pay the prosecutor's costs of the application for the order nisi and of this application to make the same absolute.

Cur. adv. vult.

The following written judgments were delivered:—

May 18 Barwick C.J.

This is an application to make absolute a rule nisi for prohibition directed to a Conciliation Commissioner (the commissioner) and a trades union in connexion with an interim award made by the commissioner in purported settlement of what he had found to be an industrial dispute extending beyond the limits of one State. The Melbourne and Metropolitan Tramways Board (the prosecutor) in support of the application submits principally that there was no such industrial dispute.

The relevant facts are few. The respondent, The Australian Tramway and Motor Omnibus Employees' Association (the union) had on an earlier occasion endeavoured to create an inter-State industrial dispute with transport authorities in more than one State with a view to obtaining an award to prevent these authorities requiring the union's members to work a tram or bus without the assistance of a conductor. This attempt led to proceedings in this Court which are reported, [1] . Following these proceedings the union served on the prosecutor, the Commissioner for Government Transport, the Adelaide Municipal Tramways Trust, the Commissioner for Motor Transport of New South Wales, and the Metropolitan Transport Trust of Tasmania, the transport authorities with whom it had earlier attempted to create a dispute, a log of claims covered by a letter of demand, dated 7th January 1966. The letter of demand was in the following terms: "The Australian Executive of this Association met on the 21st September, 1965, and directed me to serve a letter of demand on employers in every State in which Awards of the Commonwealth Conciliation and Arbitration Act cover members of this Association for an Award covering the conditions of one-man bus operators. This decision of the Australian Executive followed resolutions carried by meetings of members of the above Association calling upon the Federal Officers to apply for an Award for one-man bus operators. The Australian Tramway and Motor Omnibus Employees' Association therefore demands of you that you agree to the wages and conditions set out in the log of claims enclosed with this letter and unless you comply with this demand within seven days of the date hereof, the Union will take appropriate steps under the Conciliation and Arbitration Act." The accompanying log of claims claimed wages and conditions for financial members of the union in respect of a single classification—"one-man bus operator". Whilst this description was not the subject of express definition, it is plain from the terms of the log of claims that it referred to bus drivers required to drive "one-man vehicles" (see cl. 2 of the log of claims).