Full Judgment Text
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PETITIONER:
SALEM ERODE ELECTRICITY DISTRIBUTION COMPANY LTD.
Vs.
RESPONDENT:
SALEM ERODE ELECTRICITY DISTRIBUTION CO. LTD. EMPLOYEES
DATE OF JUDGMENT:
03/11/1965
BENCH:
GAJENDRAGADKAR, P.B. (CJ)
BENCH:
GAJENDRAGADKAR, P.B. (CJ)
WANCHOO, K.N.
HIDAYATULLAH, M.
RAMASWAMI, V.
CITATION:
1966 AIR 808 1966 SCR (2) 498
CITATOR INFO :
D 1968 SC 585 (16,20)
APL 1970 SC 512 (7,10)
R 1972 SC1201 (7,9,10)
F 1972 SC1626 (8)
R 1972 SC2326 (14)
R 1973 SC2650 (6)
R 1984 SC 505 (23)
F 1985 SC 504 (4)
ACT:
Industrial Employment (Standing Orders) Act, 1946-
Application for amendment of certified Standing Order-
Proposed amendments applying different rules to existing and
new employees-Whether fair and reasonable -Whether
certifying officer has power In law to refuse amendment.
HEADNOTE:
The appellant company, which carried on the business of
buying bulk electrical energy and distributing it to
consumers, made an application under the Industrial
Employment (Standing Orders) Act, 1946, to the Certifying
Officer, Madras, for an amendment of two of its certified
Standing-Orders relating to holidays and leave. It was
claimed by the appellant that the urgent need for increased
production and for increased supply of electrical energy
could be met if the existing rules embodied in the two
standing orders were suitably amended; the amendments pro-
posed sought to introduce different rules relating to
holidays and leave for employees who were appointed before a
specified date and those who joined service after that date.
The proposed amendments were resisted by the respondents’
union on the ground, inter alia, that they would introduce
discrimination between one se of employees and another
resulting in industrial unrest and disharmony. The
Certifying Officer upheld the respondents I plea and nega-
tived the amendments. An appeal to the appellate authority
against this decision was dismissed.
it was contended on behalf of the appellant that the
proposed amendments were fair and reasonable and that the
Certifying-Officer and, the appellate authority had erred in
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law in not certifying the Standing Orders as proposed to be
amended.
HELD : (i) The Certifying Officer and the appellate
authority committed no error of law in refusing to certify
the modified Standing Orders. [510 E]
The Act provides a self contained code and the Certifying
Officer is given the power to consider questions of fairness
and reasonableness as well as other questions indicated by
s. 4(a) and (b). An appeal is provided against the decision
of the Certifying Officer and in case a dispute arises as to
the interpretation or the application of the Standing Order,
a remedy is provided In s. 13A. A Tight is given both to
the employer and the workman to move the appropriate
authorities for modification of the existing Standing
Orders. [505 G-H]
(ii) It is clear from the provisions of the Act requiring
industrial establishments to have their Standing Orders
certified that matters specified in the Schedule to the Act
should be covered by uniform Standing Orders applicable to
all workmen employed in an industrial establishment. [505 B]
499
Rai Bahadur Diwan Badri Das V. The Industrial Tribunal,
Punjab;[1963] 3 S.C.R. 930; Associated Cement Staff Union v.
Associated Cement Co.,& Ors. (1964) 1 L.L.J. 12; Guest Keen
Williams Private Ltd. v. F. I. Sterling and others: [1960] 1
S.C.R. 348; referred to.
JUDGMENT:
CIVIL APPELLATE JURISDICTION: C.A. No. 305 of 1964.
Appeal by Special Leave from the order dated the 9th April,
1963 of the Labour Court, Coimbatore, in C.S.O. Appeal No. 1
of 1962.
M. C. Setalvad, and Naunit Lai, for the appellant.
M. K. Ramamurthi, R. K. Garg, D. P. Singh and S. C. Agar-
wala, for the respondents.
The Judgment of the Court was delivered by
Gajendragadkar, C.J. The appellant, Salem Erode Electricity
Distribution Co., Ltd., is a licensee under the Indian
Electricity Act, 1910, and its business consists in buying
electrical energy in bulk from the State Electricity Board
of Madras and selling it to consumers in Salem and Erode and
certain rural districts in the State of Madras. For the
purpose of carrying on this business, the appellant has an
industrial establishment at Salem.
In or about 1940, when the number of the appellant’s con-
sumers was about 3,000, and that of its workmen ’about 45,
the appellant framed certain terms and conditions of its
workmen’s employment. Amongst these were included terms
about leave and holidays. Later, when the Industrial
Employment (Standing Orders) Act, 1946 (No. 20 of 1946)
(hereinafter called ’the Act’) came into force, the
provisions as to leave and holidays which had been
introduced by the appellant in the terms and conditions of
the employment of its workmen, were embodied in the
appellant’s Standing Orders which were certified under the
relevant provisions of the Act in or about 1947. The said
terms read thus :-
"Standing Order 5(b)
The number of holidays to be granted to the
workmen and the days which shall be observed
as holidays by the Establishment shall be
regulated in accordance with the Factories
Act, 1948 or other relevant law for time being
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in force and the custom or usage of the
Establishment, viz., holidays under the
Negotiable Instruments Act, 1881 and festival
holidays peculiar to this locality which are
being given.
5 0 0
Standing Order 10(a) :
Leave will be given in accordance with the law
and existing practice provided the leave
facilities now available to the workers are
not curtailed in any manner".
The proceedings which have, given rise to the present appeal
by special leave between the appellant and the respondents,
its employees, began with the application made by -the
appellant on the 6th October, 1960, before the Certifying
Officer, Madras, for the amendment of the certified Standing
Orders to which we have just referred. By its application,
the management of the appellant wanted the said Orders to
read thus
"Standing Order 5(b) :
For all workmen who have joined service prior
to .... holidays under the Negotiable
Instruments Act, 1881, and festival holidays
of one day per year which day may be chosen by
the workmen shall be given. For all workmen
who have joined on and after holidays under
the Madras Industrial Establishments (National
and Festival holidays) Act, 1958 shall be
given."
"Standing Order 10(a)
Leave will be given to all employees who are
appointed on and after .... iii accordance
with the provisions of the Madras Shops and
Establishment Act, 1947 or any statutory
modification thereof (irrespective of whether
this Act applies or not to any category of
employee or employees). Provided, however,
that for all employees who have been confirmed
prior to the above said date, viz the leave
facilities now available are not curtailed in
any manner".
It is relevant to mention the background of the present
application. The appellant believed that the urgent need
for increased production and for increased supply of
electrical energy could be met if the existing rules
embodied in Standing Orders 5(b) and 10(a) were suitably
modified; and so, the appellant wanted to make the change in
the said two Standing Orders on the lines indicated by it in
its application to the Certifying Officer. It appears that
these Rules were introduced by the appellant on the 1st
October, 1960, and were embodied in the contracts of service
of new entrants who joined the appellant’s employment as
from that date. In fact, they were agreed to by such new
entrants.
501
In order to regularise the steps taken by the appellant by
revising the relevant Rules in respect of the new entrants
to its employment, the appellant made the present
application.
The change proposed to be made by the appellant in the two
Standing Orders in question was resisted by the respondents’
Union. It was urged by the respondents that the proposed
change was unfair and unreasonable, and it was also argued
that it would introduce discrimination between one set of
employees and another working under the same employer, and
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that would naturally cause industrial unrest and disharmony.
The Certifying Officer upheld the pleas raised by the
respondents and he accordingly directed that the proposed
amendments should be negatived.
The appellant then preferred an appeal against the said
order before the appellate authority. Both the parties
urged similar contentions before the appellate authority and
the said authority agreed with the view taken by the
Certifying Officer and dismissed the appeal preferred by the
appellant. It is against this order that the appellant has
come to this Court by special leave.
On behalf of the appellant, Mr. Setalvad has urged that the
change which the appellant wants to make in the two relevant
orders is, on the merits, fair and reasonable; and he adds
that the appellant wanted to prove its bona fides by making
the changed Standing Orders applicable to the future
entrants and not extending them to its employees who were
already in its employment and who are governed by the
existing Standing Orders. According to Mr. Setalvad, the
Certifying Officer and the appellate authority have erred in
law in not certifying the changed Standing Orders as
proposed by the appellant.
In dealing with this point, it is necessary to examine the
broad features of the Act and consider its main purpose and
object. The Act was passed in 1946 and its main object was
to require the employers in industrial establishments to
which the Act applied, to define formally the terms and
conditions of employment in their respective establishments.
In imposing this obligation on the employers, the Act
intended that the terms and conditions of industrial
employment should be well-defined and should be known to the
employees before they accepted the employment. As we will
presently point out, one of the objects of the Act was to
introduce uniformity of terms and conditions of employment
in respect of workmen belonging to the same category and
discharging the same or similar work under an industrial
establishment. Before the Act was passed, employees in many
industrial establishments were governed by oral terms and
conditions of service which
CI/66-2
502
were not uniform and which had been entered into on an ad
hoc basis. The Act now requires that terms and conditions
of employment in relation to matters specified in the
Schedule must be included in the Standing Orders and they
must be certified. It would at once be clear that by the
operation of the Act, all industrial establishments will
have to frame terms and conditions of service in regard to
all the matters specified in the Schedule, and that
naturally would introduce an element of uniformity inasmuch
as industrial employment in all establishments to which the
Act applied would, after the Act was passed, be governed by
terms and conditions of service in respect of matters which
are common to all of them. That, in brief, is the object
which the Act intends to achieve.
Let us now see the scheme of the Act. "Standing Orders" are
defined by s. 2(g) as meaning rules relating to matters set
out in the Schedule; these matters are 11 in number, and the
last one of them refers to any other matter which may be
prescribed "Prescribed" according to s. 2(f) means
prescribed by rules made by the appropriate Government under
this Act; and so, Standing Orders mean rules made in
relation to the matters enumerated in clauses 1 to 10 in the
Schedule as well as any other matter which may in future be
added by means of rules to be made by the appropriate
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Government. This gives a general idea about the matters
which are intended to be covered by the Standing Orders.
Section 3 of the Act requires the submission of draft Stand-
ing Orders by the employer within six months from the date
on which the Act becomes applicable to an industrial
establishment. A statutory obligation has been imposed upon
the employer to take necessary action as required by S.
3(1). Section 4 requires that the Standing Orders must deal
with every matter set out in the Schedule which is
applicable to the industrial establishment, and must be in
conformity with the provisions of the Act. Section 5 deals
with the proceedings for certification of the standing
orders by the Certifying Officer. Section 6 provides for
appeals against the orders passed by the Certifying Officer
Section 7 prescribes the date on which the certified
standing orders will come into operation. Section 10(2)
provides for the modification of the standing orders.
Section 13A provides for the machinery to deal with
questions in relation to the application or interpretation
of the standing orders certified under the Act; and s. 15
confers powers on the appropriate Government to make rules
to carry out the purposes of the Act.
5 0 3
When the Act was originally passed, the powers of the Certi-
fying Officer as well as those of the appellate authority
were limited to consider the question as to whether the
standing orders submitted for certification were in
accordance with the Act or not. By an amendment made in
1956, jurisdiction has been conferred on the Certifying
Officer as well as the appellate authority to adjudicate
upon the fairness or reasonableness of the provisions of the
Standing Orders submitted for certification. That means the
jurisdiction of the appropriate authorities functioning
under the Act has now been widened and they are required to
consider whether the Standing Orders submitted to them for
their approval are fair or reasonable. Parties can make
their contentions in respect of the fairness or
reasonableness of the proposed Standing Orders, and the
appropriate authorities will adjudicate upon the said
contentions. That is one change made in 1956.
The other change made in the original provisions of the Act
which is relevant for our purpose is in regard to the
provisions contained in S. 10(2). Under the original
provision of S. 10(2), it was only the employer who was
authorised to make an application to the Certifying Officer
to have the Standing Orders modified. By the amendment made
in 1956, even workmen are now entitled to apply for the
modification of the Standing Orders. The result of this
amendment is that if workmen are dissatisfied with the
operation of the existing Standing Orders, they can move for
their modification by applying to the Certifying Officer in
that behalf. Before this amendment was made, the only
course open to the workmen to adopt for securing any
modification in the existing Standing Orders was to raise an
industrial dispute and move the appropriate government to
refer the said dispute to the adjudication of the
appropriate Industrial Tribunal. Both these amendments have
been introduced by Act No. 36 of 1956.
Now, the question which we have to decide is : is it permis-
ible for an industrial establishment to have two sets of
Standing Orders to govern the relevant terms and conditions
of its employees ? Mr. Setalvad argues that if the change is
intended to be made in the existing Standing Orders, it
should be permissible and indeed legitimate for an employer
to seek for the change on .he ground that the said change
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would be reasonable and fair,, provided the existing rights
of employees already employed are ,lot affected by such
change. Prima facie, this argument appears to be
attractive; but if we examine the scheme of the relevant
Provisions of the Act in the light of the matters specified
in the schedule in respect of which Standing Orders are
required to be
504
made, it appears that two sets of Standing Orders cannot be
made under the Act.
Let us first examine the matters specified in the Schedule.
They are specified under cls. ( 1 ) to ( 11 ). The first is
in regard to classification of workmen. The second is in
relation to the manner of intimating to workmen periods and
hours of work, holidays, pay-days and wage rates. The third
has reference to shift working; the fourth to attendance and
late coming. Clause (5) relates to conditions of, procedure
in applying for, and the authority which may grant, leave
and holidays. Clause (6) deals with the requirement to
enter premises by certain gates, and liability to search.
Clause (7) is concerned with the closing and reopening of
sections of the industrial establishment, and temporary
stoppages of work and the rights and liabilities of the
employer and workmen arising therefrom. Clause (8) deals
with the termination of employment, and the notice thereof
to be given by employer and workmen. Clause (9) covers the
subject of suspension or dismissal for misconduct, and acts
or omissions which constitute misconduct. Clause (10)
relates to means of redress for workmen against unfair
treatment or wrongful exactions by the employer or his
agents or servants. Clause (11) is the residuary clause
which refers to any other matter which may be prescribed.
One has merely to examine these clauses one by one to be
satisfied that there is no scope for having two separate
Standing Orders in respect to any one of them. Take the
case of classification of workmen. It is inconceivable that
there can be two separate Standing Orders in respect of this
matter. What we have said about classification is equally
true about each one of the other said clauses; and so, the
conclusion appears to be irresistible that the object of the
Act is to certify Standing Orders in respect of the matters
covered by the Schedule; and having regard to these matters,
Standing Orders so certified would be uniform and would
apply to all workmen alike who are employed in any
industrial establishment.
Prior to the enactment of the Act, industrial establishments
used to employ workmen on different terms and conditions of
service and they used to enter into separate agreements with
employees on an ad hoc basis. It was precisely with the
object of avoiding this anomalous position that the Act has
been passed, and an obligation has been imposed upon the
industrial establishments to have their Standing Orders
certified by the appropriate authorities. Therefore, we do
not think Mr. Setalvad is right in
505
contending that it is open to an industrial establishment to
have two sets of Standing Orders certified in relation to
leave and holidays provided that the modified Standing
Orders apply to future entrants and the existing Standing
Orders apply to entrants who are already in the employment
of the establishment.
On principle, it seems expedient and desirable that matters
specified in the Schedule to the Act should be covered by
uniform Standing Orders applicable to all workmen employed
in an industrial establishment. It is not difficult to
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imagine how the application of two sets of Standing Orders
in respect of the said matters is bound to lead to confusion
in the working of the establishment and cause
dissatisfaction amongst the employees. If Mr. Setalvad is
right in contending that the Standing Orders in relation to
these matters can be changed from time to time, it may lead
to the anomalous result that in course of 10 or 15 years
there may come into existence 3 or 4 different sets of
Standing Orders applicable to the employees in the same
industrial establishment, the application of the Standing
Orders depending -upon the date of employment of the
respective employees. That, we think, is not intended by
the provisions of the Act.
Once the Standing Orders are made, it is not unlikely that
disputes may arise between the employer and the employees in
regard to their application or their interpretation, and the
Act has specifically made a provision for dealing with
problems of this kind. As we have already indicated,
section 13A provides that if any question arises as to the
application or interpretation of a Standing Order certified
under the Act, an employer or a workman may refer the
question to any one of the Labour Courts indicated by the
section, and the said Labour Court shall, after giving the
parties an opportunity of being heard, decide the question
and such decision be final and binding on the parties.
The result, therefore, appears to be that in regard to the
certification of the Standing Orders, the Act provides for a
self-contained Code. The Certifying Officer is given the
power to consider questions of fairness and reasonableness
as well as the other questions indicated by s. 4(a) and (b).
An appeal is provided against the decision of the Certifying
Officer and in case a dispute arises as to the
interpretation or the application of the Standing Order, a
remedy is provided by s. 13A. Besides, as we have already
pointed out, a right is given both to the employer and the
workmen to move the appropriate authorities for modification
of the existing Standing Orders. That is why we do not
think that Mr. Setalvad is right in contending that the
Certifying
506
Officer as well as the appellate authority erred in law in
refusing to certify the modified Standing Orders submitted
by the appellant for certification.
It may be that even in regard to matters covered by
certified Standing Orders, industrial disputes may arise
between the. employer and his employees, and a question may
then fall to be considered whether such disputes can be
referred to the Industrial Tribunal for its adjudication
under section 10(1) of the Industrial Disputes Act. In
other words, where an industrial dispute arises in respect
of such matters, it may become necessary to consider
whether, notwithstanding the self-contained provisions of
the Act, it would not still be open to the appropriate
Government to refer such a dispute for adjudication. We
wish to make it clear that our decision in the present
appeal has no relation to that question. In the present
appeal, the only point which we are deciding is whether
under the scheme of the Act, it is permissible to the em-
ployer to require the appropriate authorities under the Act
to certify two different sets of Standing Orders in regard
to any of the matters covered by the Schedule.
It now remains to consider the three decisions to which Mr.
Setalvad has invited our attention. In Rai Bahadur Diwan
Badri Das v. The Industrial Tribunal, Punjab(1), this Court
had to consider the question as to whether the Tribunal
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against whose award an appeal had been brought to this Court
by the appellant Rai Bahadur Diwan Badri Das was in error in
refusing to allow the appellant’s prayer that he should be
permitted to introduce a new rule in respect of leave with
wages applicable to the entrants in his employment after the
1st of July, 1956. It appears that on the said date, the
appellant made a rule that every workman employed on or
before that date would be entitled to 30 days leave with
wages after working for 11 months and workmen employed after
that date would be entitled to earned leave in accordance
with the provisions of S. 79 of the Indian Factories Act.
This rule led to an industrial dispute which was referred to
the Industrial Tribunal, and the Tribunal held that all the
workmen were entitled to 30 days earned leave as under the
existing rule and that the rule made by the appellant on the
1st of July, 1956 cannot be enforced. It was this award
which was challenged by the appellant before this Court, and
the challenge was based on the broad and general ground that
the employer had full freedom of contract to make a rule for
the employment of his employees and that the Industrial
Tribunal is not entitled to
(1) [1963] 3 S.CR. 930.
507
interfere with his freedom of contract. It appears that the
change which the employer sought to make by the new rule did
not involve any appreciable financial burden, and it was not
the case of the appellant that the existing rule caused any
hardship to him. The appellant, however, wanted to urge
before this Court the theoretical ground that in a matter of
employment, an industrial employer is entitled to make his
own conditions with his employees and that industrial
adjudication should not interfere with his freedom of
contract in that behalf. Indeed, as the majority judgment
shows, the appellant was a good employer and was treating
his employees in a very liberal manner. He, however,
brought the dispute before this Court in order to assert the
general principle which was raised for the decision of this
Court. That is the background of the majority decision in
Rai Bahadur Diwan Badri Das’s(1). case.
Dealing with the broad point raised by the learned Solicitor
General on behalf of the appellant in that case, this Court
held that several decisions pronounced by industrial
adjudication had now established the principle that the
doctrine of absolute freedom of contract had to yield to the
higher claims for social justice. Even so, this Court took
the precaution of making it clear that the general question
about the employer’s right to manage his own affairs in the
best way he chooses, cannot be answered in the abstract
without reference to the facts and circumstances in regard
to which the question is raised, and it was pointed out that
in industrial matters of this kind, there are no absolutes
and no formula can be evolved which would invariably give an
answer to different problems which may be posed in different
cases on different facts.
Having thus dealt with the general point raised by the
learned Solicitor-General in Rai Bahadur Diwan Badri
Das’s(1) case, the majority decision considered the facts in
that particular case and held that the Tribunal was not
shown to have been in error when it held that in the matter
of earned leave there should be uniformity of conditions of
service governing all the employees in the service of the
appellant. It was in that connection that reference was
made to the fact that in regard to all the other terms and
conditions of service, there was uniformity in the
appellant’s establishment itself; and so, it was thought
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that the Tribunal might have been justified in discouraging
a departure from the said uniformity in respect of one item,
viz., earned leave. It would thus be clear that this
decision does not lay down any general
(1) [1963] 3 S.C.R 930.
508
principle at all. In fact, this decision emphatically
brings out the point that in dealing with industrial
disputes, industrial adjudication should always resist the
temptation of laying down any broad, general or unqualified
propositions. Therefore, we do not think that the decision
of this Court in the case of R. B. Diwan Badri Das(1) is of
much assistance. In that case, the Court was dealing with
an award pronounced by an Industrial Tribunal in an
industrial dispute; and the narrow question which the Court
decided was that the Industrial Tribunal was not in error in
not upholding the rule made by the employer on the 1st July,
1956. In the present case, we are dealing with proceedings
arising under the Act and that means that considerations
which govern the present proceedings are not necessarily the
same as those which would govern the decision of an
industrial dispute brought before the Industrial Tribunal
for its adjudication under the Industrial Disputes Act.
The next decision to which Mr. Setalvad has referred was
pronounced by this Court in the case of Associated Cement
Staff Union and Another v. Associated Cement Company and
Others(1). During the course of the hearing of this appeal,
some arguments were urged before us on the question about
the relation between terms and conditions of service
governing working hours, leave, and the like, and the wages
paid to the employees. Mr. Ramamurti who appeared for the
respondents conceded that the terms and conditions in regard
to leave or working hours can be changed; but he contended
that the increase in the working hours or the reduction of
earned leave should not be permitted to be introduced
without taking into account the question about the
consequent increase in the wage structure itself; and it was
with a view to combat this contention that Mr. Setalvad
referred us to the decision in the Associated Cement Co.(1).
In that case, the question of holidays, working hours and
wages were all referred to the Industrial Tribunal for its
decision. The matter which arose for the decision of this
Court in the appeals which were brought to this Court in
that case, was, inter alia, in regard to holidays. The
Tribunal had allowed 21 holidays, whereas this Court reduced
the number to 16. Dealing with the question about the
normal working hours, this Court observed that "once a
conclusion about the normal working hours is reached after
considering the optimum working hours on a consideration of
all the relevant factors, industrial adjudication cannot
hesitate to give effect to its conclusion merely because the
workmen would have been entitled
(1) [1963] 3 S.C.R 348.
(2) [1964] 1 L.L.J. 12.
509
to more wages at overtime rates if the hours of work had
been fixed at less". Mr. Setalvad relies upon this
observation. But we think it would be unreasonable to read
this observation in isolation, because in the very next
sentence, this Court has added that it is true that in
fixing the proper wage-scale, the question of workload and
the matter of working hours cannot be left wholly out of
consideration, though it further observed that many other
factors including the need of the workmen, the financial
resources of the employer, the rates of wages prevailing in
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other industries in the region, have all to be considered in
deciding the wage scale. It appears that in that case, the
Tribunal itself had held that 21 holidays erred on the side
of excessive liberality, and yet it did not reduce that
number. That is why this Court reduced the number of
holidays from 21 to 16. This decision, in our opinion, does
show that where industrial adjudication has to deal with an
industrial dispute in relation to wage structure, working
hours, and holidays, it must consider the problem comprehen-
sively and in prescribing the working hours, and making
provision for holidays and leave with or without pay,
amongst other relevant factors, the wages paid to the
’employees have no doubt to be taken into account. But
these considerations do not arise in the present
proceedings, because what the appropriate authorities under
the Act had to consider was whether two sets of Standing
Orders should be permitted under the same establishment or
not.
The last case to which reference must be made is Guest,
Keen, William Private Ltd. v. P. J. Sterling and Others(1).
In that case, the Standing Order had been certified under
the Act prior to its amendment. The relevant Standing Order
had relation to the age of retirement of the employees under
the establishment in question. When the Standing Order was
certified, its fairness and reasonableness could not have
been examined by the Certifying Authority. After it was
certified, the employer sought to give effect to the age of
retirement in regard to employees who were already in its
employment; and that gave rise to an industrial dispute.
The employees who were already in the employment of the
employer, contended that prior to the certification of the
Standing Order, there was no, age of retirement in the
concern and they urged that the certified Standing Order
could not affect their right to continue in the employment
so long as they were fit to discharge their duties. It was
in the contending this dispute that the question arose as to
whether the certified Standing Order applied to the
previously existing employees. The Labour Appel-
(1) [1960] 1 S.C.R. 348.
510
late Tribunal against whose decision the appeal was brought
to this Court by the appellant Guest, Keen, Williams Private
Ltd., had held that the certified Standing Order could not
apply to the ,employees who were already in the employment
of the appellant. This Court affirmed the view expressed by
the Labour Appellate Tribunal that the certified Standing
Order could not affect the rights of the previous employees;
nevertheless, it was held that the question of prescribing
an age of retirement for them could be considered in the
proceedings before the Court and under the special
circumstances to which reference has been made in the
judgment, it was thought that the age of superannuation for
prior employees could be reasonably and fairly fixed at 60
years. This decision again is not of any assistance,
because the matter came to this Court from an industrial
dispute which was the subject,matter of industrial
adjudication before the Industrial Tribunal and the Labour
Appellate Tribunal; and all that this Court did was to fix
an age of superannuation or workmen who had been employed
prior to the date of the certification of the relevant
Standing Order, at 60, and that course was adopted under the
special and unusual circumstances expressly stated in the
course of the judgment. As we have already pointed out, the
question as to whether two sets of Standing Orders can be
certified under the provisions of the Act, did not fall to
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be considered in that case. Therefore, we are satisfied
that the Certifying Officer as well as the appellate
authority committed no error of law in refusing to certify
the modified Standing Orders submitted by the appellant in
the present proceedings.
The result is, the appeal fails and is dismissed with costs.
Appeal dismissed.
511