The Industrial Conciliation and Arbitration Act 1894 was a piece of industrial relations legislation passed by the Parliament of New Zealand in 1894. Enacted by the Liberal Government of New Zealand, it was the world's first compulsory system of state arbitration. It gave legal recognition to unions and enabled them to take disputes to a Conciliation Board, consisting of members elected by employers and workers. The process by which the Act came into being needs study in its own right and was based on a scheme devised by a South Australian politician, Charles Kingston.