HUMAN DIVIDENDS

Wairarapa Times-Age, 13 June 1939, Page 6

HUMAN DIVIDENDS

BRITISH COAL COMPANY’S WELFARE SCHEME HAPPY RELATIONS BETWEEN CAPITAL & LABOUR. COLLIERY DEDVELOPMENTS. Throughout England, as in other nations, there are many adventures in happy relationships between capital labour, writes Commander Frank B. Kemp. Numerous employers have undertaken to provide their workers with satisfactions beyond the mere rate of pay and hours of labour. Nowhere is this trend more' pronounced than in the collieries, where Government and employers alike show new enlightenment in their concern that the miners shall be happy above ground. And the Ashington Coal Company is typical of such social progressiveness. Consider a town of 30,000 people, all of whom depend upon the coal pits for a living. They live in serried rows of houses, many of which have no gardens.

And up to 1920 the facilities afforded these men and boys for playing outdoor games consisted of one small cricket field and a football ground. What did the majority do for recreation? Chiefly they assembled at corner-ends and gossipped, or they went after' rabbits. The men spent most of their evenings at the clubs, which, in the majority of cases, were mere drinking dens. The development of welfare work in industry altered all this.- The Ashington Coal Compand was asked to experiment with a welfare scheme. It was a purely private affair sponsored by the directors of the company who financed it, gave all the land needed, and erected the necessary buildings. In 1921, the National Miners Welfare Fund was established, but the Ashington recreational scheme has remained the private concern of the company, receiving no assistance from the National Fund. SOUND FOUNDATION. Why start with games? Because the foundation of industrial welfare schemes in places as primitive as a mining town 20 years ago would be best “laid in the provision of adequate recreational facilities, particularly among the young people. Nowhere can the team spirit be inculcated so rapidly and successfully as on the playing fields. “Playing the game” and “Playing for the side” have passed into proverbs, but their applicability to the problems of the day has not lessened with-age. It may be that the bottling up of energies, mental and physical, which, in youth at all events, should find a natural outlet in outdoor recreation, has resulted in that warped outlook on life which has seemed to isolate the extremist and set his hand against everybody. And quite a number of juvenile delinquencies may be attributed to a lack of opportunity for the free use of youthful vigour in outdoor sports and pastimes.

Ashington started with a football league, with divisions for men and boys. This met with such response that 25 teams were organised. Today, football is still the most popular game, and the Ashington Collieries’ League still functions with three divisions and about 27 teams.

Cricket was added and tennis started; and, in turn, hockey and Rugby football. There are now about 70 acres of laid-out playing grounds in four centres, comprising 13 football pitches, four cricket and hockey grounds, and 35 tennis courts.

Today, games are as important tc Ashington as to any other more favoured community in England. Today the playing fields arc ablaze with col our from the blazers of the differen' sports groups. Very different from the drab picture before 1920. When the cricket team was started in the Welfare Department, one of the earlier matches was a few miles away, and it was intimated to the boys tha' they should dress in white flannels before going out to the ground. "Ho’way,” said one of the lads, “do ye fancy we’re daft? They'll think we're guising.” (“Guising” is the word for dressing-up at Christmas). But they finally dressed their game in white. SPORTS CLUB. The Welfare Sports Club has a membership of about 3600 and as a rule there are more players than spectators. On three of the grounds, institutes have been erected and two of them have well-equipped gymnasiums with a properly qualified physical training instructor. Indoor games) such as badminton, table tennis, and I

darts are popular. There are 22 teams in the table tennis league. Membership in the Sports Club, which means participation in every game and recreational activity provided, if desired, costs 2d per week. In 1922, Ashington installed a canteen. Now there are six. They do not provide a large number of full meals. Most of the men live close to their work and can easily get home for meals. Surface workers who live at any distance, however, bring their own food, which is warmed for them.

Perhaps the most useful function of the canteens is performed at night. Prior to their existence, thousands of men and boys either began or finished their work during the night, and it can be imagined that work was entailed on the part of the women by the necessary meals and washing required by their men folk. Now those who wish may take their food to the canteen. After cleaning up at the pithead baths they can go home to bed without disturbing the household.

The first baths at Ashington were erected in 1924. The money accruing from the Miners National Fund has been spent by the Ashington joint committees solely in the provision of pithead baths, of which there are four installations, in a swimming bath, in a technical school, and in an extension to the local hospital. The Ashington Collieries Magazine, which has a considerable circulation, national and even international, as well as local, is in no sense a publicity organ but is a works magazine. Begun in January, 1921, the •magazine’s function is mainly to coordinate all the welfare activities of Ashington Colleries. Most of the magazine copy is contributed locally. The Ashington Coal Company in 1920 granted a building and facilities for a continuation school, which should accommodate about 120 of its boy workers. These are selected according to ability and character and quite irrespective of their father’s positions. Each pupil goes to school on two days a week, drawing full wages for those days. The course, which is nonvocational, lasts for three years, and those who do well are assisted to pursue a further course of study with the idea of fitting themselves for official positions with the company.

The company owns quite a few miles of coastline, and facilities have been afforded men and their families for cheap camping. Bungalows and tents are available for hire.

During the stoppages of work, which occurred for 14 weeks in 1921 and seven months in 1926, all the welfare activities were allowed to go on, although no contributions were forthcoming during those periods, and the magazine was distributed free of charge. When the men returned to work no arrears were asked for.