A FREE PEOPLE

Waikato Times, Volume 125, Issue 20950, 1 November 1939, Page 7

A FREE PEOPLE

BRITISH INDUSTRY MEET ALL DEMANDS EMPLOYERS AND WORKERS (omclal Wireless.) (Received Nov. 1, -11 a.m.) RUGBY, Oct. 31 Mr E. Brown, Minister of Labour, in a broadcast talk on the contribution of industry to the war effort, said:

“As a great industrial country we had already great resources of skill and plant, and to these great additions have been made and are being made, so that there will not be a

doubt that whatever effort is required this country will be able to meet all demands which will 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 free institutions. “It is a remarkable fact that we were able to enter upon the war without imposing any new form of legislative control upon the regulation of wages and working conditions. During the past 20 years we have been steadily setting up in each industry joint machinery through which representatives of the employers and the work-people manage the affairs of their industries and settle their own conditions. As 1 speak this joint machinery is in operation to adopt thbse conditions to war circumstances. Fight For Freedom “In the fight for freedom we have the inestimable gain of fighting with the aid of a 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 the forces that threaten those institutions and that endanger the liberty of workpeople throughout the world.

“They believe that its object is to create circumstances in which their fellows in Germany will be able to regain the freedom to live their own lives and have again their own free organisations. Tomorrow afternoon there will take place the first meeting of the National Joint Advisory Council, to which 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 is 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 a common interest.” Position Not Prejudiced Mr Brown stated that skilled workers are to work on work so far reserved for skilled men, and that a register of such cases would be kept, so that when peace conditions return the position of skilled men will not be prejudiced. Reconstruction and Expansion The Minister continued with a survey of the way in which the various industries had met and were meeting the particular difficulties occasioned by the war. “A list of key occupations has been compiled in order that men in such occupations shall not be taken from industry unless required in the forces for work in which they are skilled,” he said. “This will assure as far as possible that industry is kept fully manned to produce munitions and maintain the peace of the nation, and also that when the war is over industry generally will have a basis for reconstruction and expansion.” Mr Brown concluded with a special word of praise for the British merchant seamen and fishermen in their most vital and hazardous work.