The Press Friday, March 31, 1922. Industrial Crisis in Britain.
According to the latest cable mesages a yery grave economic and industrial situation is developing from the disputes in the engineering and shipbuilding industries in Britain. In regard to the former the dispute centres chiefly on j the question of overtime and night shifts, and according to the chairman of the Engineering Employers' Federation, the issue is whether the employers pr the "shop stewards" shall say how the engineering business is to be run. Protracted negotiations with the Amalgamated Engineering Union proved fruitless, and three weeks ago a lock-out began. The dispute extends to 47 allied unions against whom the lock-out is also to operate. The total number locked-out is 776,000, exclusive of 90,000 previously unemployed. In the shipbuilding trade the dispute concerns the cost of living bonuses granted during the war amounting to 26s 6d a week, exclusive of the 7b a week granted by the Industrial Court. In January the employers proposed the immediate withdrawal of the 26s 6d. The unions concerned refused to entertain this proposal, as well as a. later one to take off 16s 6dfrom March 15th, in spite of the employers' contention that when during the war the cost of living was round about the figure at which it now stands, the men were only receiving 10s of the 26s 6d bonus. Finally, despite the fact that the state of the industry and the volume of unemployment'were never, w6rse, the men's leaders rejected a proposal to take off 10s 6d a week on March 17 l th, and a further 6s on, March 29th, leaving the remaining 10s> in abeyance. Accordingly the employers decided on a lock-out operating from Tuesday, and involving 30(),000 men. It is, estimated that 1,600,000 workers will be added to the general unemployment figures, which will reach tho appalling total of 3,350,000. Thus, owing to the uncompromising attitude of the leaders of the trade unions concerned in regard to the changed economic conditions since the war, Britain is faced to-day with an even graver industrial situation than that produced by the great coal strike of twelive months ago. Shipping, the most vital transport agency of Great Britain, haa rarely had to face a more diffioult task than the dramatic descent from the peak attained in 1920. In doing bo it has reduced its handmaid, the shipbuilding trade, to one among the three most depressed industries in the country. In the middle of last year the gross shipping tonnage of the world wa3 nearly 13 million tons or 26 per cent, more than in 1914. Many of tho ships are old and will never be efficient freight earners, hut they will not "be scrapped while the cost of replacing them remains so high, to say nothing of the cost of breaking them up. But with the increase in tonnage there has been a decrease in the quantity of goods exchanged in foreign trade. In the United Kingdom th© total tonnage of vessels entered and cleared with cargoes in 1921 was only 62 per cent, of the total in 1913, while the tonnage of imports was 70 per cent., of exports only 36 per cent., and of imports and exports combined. 42 per cent, of the corresponding figures for 1913. Freights have consequently declined enormously, but even this has failed to stimulate trade, and at the present time 2,250,000 tons of British shipping alone is lying idle. The effect of these conditions upon the shipbuilding industry is clearly shown by the returns of Lloyd's Register for the last quarter of 1921. The tonnage nominally under instruction in Britain on' December 31st was leas than it had been since June, 1919, and, even so, tho figures were over-stated, since they included over a million tons on which work had been suspended, leaving little more than 1,500,000 tons on which work was actually proceeding, as against 3,700,000 tons in 1920. It was surprising, therefore, that the percentage of unemployment in tike shipbuilding industry was not higher than 34.5 per cent., the reason being that many shipbuilding firms had turned over to shore constructional work. Discussing tlis position a few weeks ago, tho "Eeono"mist'' pointed out that to make either shipowning or Shipbuilding remunerative there must be a reduction in costs. After instancing many reductions in the cost of plates, castings, and other materials, the paper remarked that the big item in the oost of shipbuilding which had not fallen was labour. Government figures showed that whereas thfe miners had accepted wags reductions ia the first eleven months of 1921
averaging 38s Id per week, and iron ,-liid steel workers reductions averaging 36s Id, the corresponding reduction in the shipbuilding and engineering group was no more than 9a 7d per week. A revival in the shipbuilding industry would do much to revive the iron and steel industries of Britain, for on the averago one ton of iron and steel is required for every 2.1 tons of shipping tonnage built; a revival of shipbuilding would therefore mitigate thf> unemployment, not only in its own industry, but also m the iron nnd steel, coalmining, iron ore mining, limestone quarrying, and transport industries. Yet the hundred or more trad© unions connected with the shipbuilding and engineering industries, T>y obstinately refusing to accept a reduction in wax-time wages while more than a third of their members and a million and three quarters in other trades are wholly unemployed, are bringing about a serious industrial crisis in the gravest period of the economic history of Britain. There is a moral in this for many workers in New Zealand.
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Press, Volume LVIII, Issue 17418, 31 March 1922, Page 6
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938The Press Friday, March 31, 1922. Industrial Crisis in Britain. Press, Volume LVIII, Issue 17418, 31 March 1922, Page 6
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