THE LABOUR MOVEMENT

Evening Star, Issue 22144, 26 September 1935, Page 6

THE LABOUR MOVEMENT

(By Trade Unionist.) drivers IN CARRYING INDUSTRY. In my previous notes I mentioned that at present therb mas sitting in Melbourne a commission set up by the Victorian Government which was taking evidence on the feasibility or otherwise of the introduction of the 40-hour-week in industry in that State. My notes referred to the evidence of a considerable displacement of workers in the rubber industry by rationalisation and other means. The latest report to hand is the evidence given by employees in the carrying industry. Mr W. Turner, who is the Victorian State secretary of the Federated Carters and Drivers’ Union, in the course of lengthy evidence before the commission, said: “In estimating the extent of the displacement of labour in the transport industry there were many factors to be. taken into consideration. Some of the most notable of these were: (1) Introduction of mechanical locomotion; (2) improved methods of loading and delivery, mechanical and other; (3) increased productivity of the individual; (4) the introduction of the task system; (5) the expenditure of public and private money on new devices; (6) changed business methods, including the amalgamation of businesses and consequent elimination of competition. No. 2 included the introduction of mechanical lifts, hoists, etc. No. 4 had become increasingly prevalent in some sections of the industry; times were set for each load sent out. A favourite device was to have a ‘ star ’ driver, who set the pace and reduced the recognised time for a trip, and other drivers had to conform. Another method was the payment of a bonus to the man who did an extra trip, which, was then included in the ordinary programme. Expenditure of municipal and Government money on the improvement of roads enabled greater loads to be hauled than in the past; the introduction of the sewerage system displaced hundreds of sanitary carters, depot hands, etc.; the expenditure of Government money on improved wharves, railway sheds, electric cranes, and coal conveyors gave greater facility in loading and delivery.” In dealing with transport in sections Mr Turner stated, in regard to the transport of road metal, excavation material, and the like, that 20 years ago this was entirely conveyed by onehorse tip drays having a capacity of one to one and a-half yards. To-day the tip dray had almost disappeared. Road metal was now carted in five-ton trucks with a capacity of syds. Thus tho metal vehicle of to-day had a capacity five times that of the tip dray and a speed of up to 20 miles an hour, as against two to two and a-half miles of the tip dray. Excavation material was mostly carted to-day in tipping trucks with a syds capacity. Tip drays in the past were loaded by labourers using picks and shovels, but to-day the big jobs were done with steam shovels, which lifted approximately a yard at a time and dropped it into the truck. Mr Turner went on to quote the number of drivers employed on;a similar job to-day and in 1916, He estimated that one motor driver was doing work previously performed by seven or eight horse drivers, doing at least three times as much as the horse vehicles. Timber carting had been affected by tho introduction of-electric cranes for loading, and the introduction of motor vehicles had displaced at least twothirds of- the labour previously employed. A new type of motor had been introduced for carting timber from the wharf to the timber yard and for short suburban deliveries. This machine, ran oyer timber stacked on skids, and picked up a load and conveyed it without tying, and carried from two to five tons a load. Mr Turner maintained that the position of carters in relation to the expenditure of public money had been unfair and, economically immoral, in that the whole of the benefits gained from these improvements had gone to the employers. The employees, who had as taxpayers to subscribe a good part of the cash involved, received no return. Thus it had already been shown that the erection of a coal conveyor on the wharf opposite tho gasworks had eliminated about 40 dray drivers. The erection of electric cranes on the timber wharves had enabled employers to reduce the amount of labour engaged, and the erection of the Spencer street bridge had brought a large reduction in the number of carters employed. * * # « A FORTY-HOUR WEEK. The question of shorter working hours is pre-eminently one on which the united efforts of the trade union movement require to be concentrated, said Mr Gurney Rowlerson, in his presidential address at the conference of the National Union of Tailors and Garment Workers, at Scarborough, last month. In the garment industry, Mr Rowlerson said, conditions are such that a 40-hour week is not only a pos-. sibility but a practical necessity. “ Tne shorter working week, as was pointed out at Geneva, is an economic and social necessity, which the trade unions have advocated not primarily as a means of alleviating the unemplbyment situation, but as a measure rendered necessary by the increasing mechanisation and rationalisation of production which is resulting in an increasing displacement of human, labour. None of the arguments put forward in opposition to this measure from the employers’ side, meets this fundamental fact. Modern industrial technique secures a larger and ever-in-creasing output per unit of human labour, and the machine technique ought to produce not only an abundance of goods, but more leisure and a higher standard of living for the producing class.” Mr Rowlerson, referring to the upward tendencies now apparent in trade unionism, said: “ One of the most encouraging signs of the time is the increase in membership of unions and the consolidation of their financial resources. Non-unionism, however, remains a problem, and it is one that our own union is confronted with in an exceptional degree. I cannot understand the mentality of the non-unionist. I cannot respect men and women who are willing to take the improvements in wages, working hours, and conditions of employment won by their organised fellow-workers, without their help and support. ‘‘l cannot understand the lack of sportsmanship, to say nothing of the lack of intelligence, displayed by nonunionists in taking the benefits of trade unionism without sharing the burden which their organised fellowworkers are carrying in the effort to improve conditions for all the wageearning class. “ Conditions in our industry to-day arc not ideal, but they arc far better than they were, ami the improvement is due entirely to organisation and united action.

“ Long ago, at conferences of the Amalgamated Society of Tailors and the Scottish Operative Tailors in 1865 and 1867, trade unionism and the amalgamation of unions were urged by those who asked why clothing trade workers should work 12 or 14 hours a day for lower wages than were obtained by other bodies of workers for a nine-hour day; and 1 remember the same argument being used in 1900. Its logic appears to me to be irresistible and overwhelming.” Mechanisation in the clothing factories, Mr Rowlerson declared, is one of the problems confronting the union. “ Evidence lias been collected from branches which shows that in many cases, while output has increased, the number of workers employed has fallen; moreover, the conveyor belt encourages the further exploitation ot juvenile labour. Factories are being manned with juvenile labour. Adult workers, as a consequence, are being ousted from employment. In some operations, particularly pressing, girls are employed while male pressers walk the streets workless. “ This is a problem which other sections of industry are concerned with, and it seems to me to be one that must be dealt with as a question of social policy. From the standpoint of social well-being it is plainly irrational and harmful that juvenile labour should be exploited and the labour of adult men and women left as a drug on the market. Employment in my view should be concentrated upon the mature and able-bodied sections of the working population, and the labour of juveniles and aged persons withdrawn from industry. “ The proper remedy for the problem of tho juvenile worker in competition with the adult workers lies in the raising 'of the school-leaving age, coupled with a reduction in the present working hours, the compulsory abolition of overtime wherever possible, and the limitation of the number of juvenile workers to a proper proportion of adult workers. This would secure to those juveniles employed some chance of effective training in the production of garments, instead of being, as they are now,_ simply cogs in the wheel for repetition work.”—‘ Industrial News ’ •* * * * SUBSIDIARY OF COMMUNIST PARTY. The Victorian State ! Australian Labour Party executive, at a meeting held on September 8, ruled that the Victorian Council Against War and Fascism was a subsidiary of the Communist Party. The president (Mr Holland, M.L.A.) ruled that no member associated with the council could remain a member of _ the Australian Labour Party. The discussion at the executive meeting was at times of a very bitter'character, and some very straight talk was indulged in. A proposal that the matter should be referred to the next annual conference of the party was ruled out of order. Mr Crofts made a bitter attack on Labourites who associated themselves with the Victorian Council Against War, They were assisting, in effect, to undermine the political party which had given them birth, and had made it pos sible for them to hold responsible positions. It was a ■ case of practically “ selling out. to the enemy. Miss Jean Daley said that the Communist Party was masquerading under the name of the Victorian Council Against War merely for the purpose of trying to “ white ant ” tbe Labour movement. Other speakers contended that the Victorian Council Against War was attempting by fair or foul means to commit the Labour Party to the policy of the Communist Party. Having failed by forcible means to • bend the Labour Party to its will, or to prevail upon it to act in conjunction with it, the Communist Party was now seeking to undermine the Labour movement by what was described as “ peaceful penetration.” Many members of the Labour Party are associated with the Victorian Council against War and Fascism, and it is expected, following the executive’s decision, that they will cease having anything to do with the organisation. The Melbourne Trades Hall Council executive reported that it had received a request from the Victorian _ State Labour executive to confer with- it relative to the attitude of the industrial and political wings of the movement to the Victorian Council against War and Fascism, and that as a result of thei interview the following decision was arrived at“ That this conference of executive officers of the Trades Hall Council and the A.L.P. believes that the Victorian Council against War and Fascism is a subsidiary group of the Communist Party, and therefore the V.C.A.W. and F. comes within the ambit of the A.L.P. conferences and the Trades Hall Council’s _ resolutions dealing with the Communist Party and its subsidiary groups.” ‘Australian Worker.’ » » * * OPTIONAL ARBITRATION. At the annual meeting of the Otago Drivers’ Union, held on Tuesday evening, the following statement appeared in the annual report, in to the future settlement of industrial _ disputes:—“The question of the abolition of the compulsory reference of industrial disputes to the Arbitration Court is going to cpme in for some discussion in the trade union movement in New Zealand in the near future. Some of y<pu will have noticed that the Prime Minister, Mr Forbes, has stated that it is not the intention of his Government to reestablish this method of settling disputes. Some of the members of the union will probably have definite views on the question, either for or against arbitration. they have to face the fact that there is no arbitration to refer to, and we have to fix up our disputes with hard negotiations with the employers and to place ourselves in the position of sellers v. buyers, trying with the best strategy we possess to secure tho best price possible for the labour power we have to sell.” The report goes on to state that tho union wants to get an award, nqt something it will bo ashamed of after it gets it, and if it is to do this the membership has to bo educated up to the point where it will stick at a minimum wage, etc., that can be considered to be a fair living wage commensurate with the present cost of living prices for, say, a man, his wife, and three children. # # » THAT 10 PER CENT. CUT. Seeing that the Government has promised a further restortion of per cent, in the salary cuts to the Civil servants, it was quite proper that an influential deputation from the trade union movement should have waited upon the Prime Minister to urge that the Arbitration Court should be again asked to function, in the same way as it did when it made the cut, in restoring to the general body of workers covered by awards the wages they previously reduced by the _ same process. I previously mentioned in this column that a substantial number of local bodies and employers had restored the cut to their employees, but there are always some who will not do the fair and reasonable thing without some element of compulsion. The Arbitration Court has this power, and if the Government wishes to overcome some of the unpopularity with the workers which Mr Forbes is always talking about, it has only to comply" with the request of the deputation that waited upon him last week in Wellington^