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Organisation of the labour force - getting workers where they are needed
And now if I may proceed to deal with the problem in greater detail, one of the first acts of the Government was to hand over to the Ministry of Labor very great powers to deal with man power, and the question arose as to how those powers should be exercised. The first step I took was to appoint a Consultative Committee between the Trade Union Congress, the employers and myself, over which I
have regularly presided and by which I have the opportunity of gauging what would be the reaction of industry in relation to each step that it has been necessary to take.
One of the most difficult problems was dealt with by the Restriction on Engagement Order. The labor situation was in chaos. Contracts had been given out to different firms on a basis which enabled them to poach men from other employers and from local authorities, and the steps they were taking to achieve their end would have soon resulted in a complete disorganization of our industrial effort. What was more serious was that this was undermining the whole of the Trade Union Movement itself. Agents of a very undesirable kind, who were bribing people to leave one place to go to another and who were profiting by such exchange, were beginning to spring up. We had to look to the future: that way anarchy lies.
We also proceeded to set up a Board of Labor Directors —experienced men drawn from management and the Trade Unions, who knew the lay-out of the shops, who knew industry and labor problems, assisted by representatives of the Department; and no Government could have been better served than we have been by this Board.
We then created the Labor Supply Committees in many districts of the country. Here again, while they had to be hurriedly improvised and appointments made with great expedition, the individuals who have been appointed have justified the creation of this machine, and I am not too sure that with the great experience we are gaining for war purposes, it may not be demonstrated that such an institution should be maintained in peace time instead of allowing men and women to stand by and skill be lost because there is no scientific approach to these problems. We found that there was a maldistribution of skilled labor and I felt that if I had to come to the craft unions and get them to dilute for war purposes to a low proportion, they had a right to say, "We must have the fullest possible use made of the craftsman and in his proper position." We tried, in the first place, to aid the solution by a new agreement governing the tool shop, a problem which baffled so many in the last war. I feel this very highly skilled branch of industry still will have to be considered. Its value has certainly been recognized and its capital value to the country cannot be expressed in pounds, shillings and pence. I am sure that when the time comes for the craft unions to re-examine the experience of the war and the outcome of these developments they will not throw them away; they will see what adaptations they can make in order that those of such value to the community are properly remunerated—and not merely remunerated, but given the right status.
We decided that we had to create a great central machine but that in its administration we would carry devolution down to the lowest possible point. Accordingly, the pivot of the organization was based on the Ministry’s Divisional Controllers. I am conscious of the enormous burden that I have laid upon them and their local staffs. It is very difficult to graft an improvised organization on to a settled machine such as the Ministry’s administrative scheme is, but they have responded splendidly. The Employment Exchanges that had to undertake this duty had, for many years, been engaged mainly with grappling with masses of unemployed. The whole outlook had to be changed. They had to be directed to placing people and not merely paying people. The Exchange machinery had not been expanded as it ought to have been to meet this contingency. Even the accommodation, in many cases, was totally inadequate and had to be extended with great rapidity. Staffs had to be collected who had not had previous experience. I mention these things because sometimes, in the Press, when there are little slip-ups, they are immediately exaggerated and there is a total absence of appreciation or mention of the enormous part the Employment Exchanges have played.
But I have had experience in the most intensely bombed areas, and it is a matter for admiration and pride the way the staff of the Employment Exchanges have stood up to it. One Exchange was bombed out and our records all put out of order; we had to rely on the people’s own statement of their claims, and it speaks well for the honesty and integrity of the working people that in scarcely a single case was our staff misled or were overclaims made.