KEEPING LIBERTY ALL RESOURCES

Gisborne Herald, Volume LXVI, Issue 20083, 1 November 1939, Page 7

KEEPING LIBERTY

ALL RESOURCES

| BRITISH ADVANTAGE FREEDOM OF PEOPLE INDUSTRIAL ACCORD ADVISORY COUNCIL (Elec. Tel, Copyright—United Press Assn.) (British Oflicinl Wireless.) Reed. 11.50 a.m. RUGBY, Oct. 31. The Minister of National Service, Mr. Ernest Brown, in a broadcast talk on the contribution of industry to the war effort said that as a great ndustrial country, Great Britain had already great resources of skill and plant, and to these great additions .ad been made and were being made, so that there would be no doubt that, whatever effort was required, the country will be able to meet all demands which would be made upon it.

“This is a formidable task, but we have entered upon it with an asset which our opponent does not possess, the asset of being a free people with Dee institutions,” declared Mr. Brown.

“It is a remarkable fact that we were able to enter upon, the war without imposing any new form oi legislative control upon the regulation and wages and working conditions. During the past 20 years we have been steadily setting up in each industry joint machinery through which the representatives of the employers and the work people manage the affairs of their industries and settle their own conditions .

Adapting Conditions

“As I speak this joint machinery is in operation to adapt those conditions to me war circumstances.

“In the fight for freedom we have the inestimable gain of fighting with the aid of the free organisation of employers and work people, carrying on their work in the way they have themselves decided.

“The powerful trade union movement in Great Britain is convinced that the war is against forces that •threaten those institutions and that endanger the liberty of work people throughout the world. They believe its object is to create circumstances in which their fellows in Germany will be able to regain freedom to live their own lives and have again their own free organisations. Meeting of Council “To-morrow afternoon there will take place the first meeting of the national joint advisory council, tc which the general council of the Trades Union Congress and the British Employers’ Confederation have appointed representatives. These representatives will be in touch with all industries, and when I say that, directly represented on one side or the other are agriculture, cotton, wool, shipping, engineering and retail distribution. it will be seen how great i: the knowledge which is placed at the disposal of the Government.

“The purpose of the council is to advise the Government on questions in which employers and workers have common interest.”

Mr. Brown stated that the skilled trade unions had voluntarily agreed to allow less skilled workers to work by their side on work so far reserved for skilled men, and that a register of such cases would be kept so that when peace conditions returned, the position of the skilled men would not be prejudiced. ’