SATURDAY, APRIL 30, 1892.

Auckland Star, Volume XXIII, Issue 102, 30 April 1892, Page 4

SATURDAY, APRIL 30, 1892.

Co-operation is one of the measures proposed by some earnest thinkers and by many enthusiastic workers as a remedy for many of the evil results attendant upon the division of the industrial forces of our times into the two opposing camps of Capital and Labour. A century ago there were no colossal factories, no enormous coal mines, and but few large towns or overgrown cities. England then was a hive of industry indeed, but not as we now see it. The homely whirr of the spin-ning-wheel, then heard in every house in the land, is now replaced by the din and clatter of machinery in tens of thousands of factories.

When Watt harnessed the steam engine to the spinning ienny and the power loom, the industrial world entered into a form of life the like of which had never before been seen in the history of mankind, Coal and iron and steam have dragged along the car of Civilisation at a pace which we proudly term progress, and in a direction which we are beginning to think may not be altogether safe. To - day we are clothed in cheap cloth and cheap calico. A servant maid dresses better than a duchess of old. The generality of men move on wheels, and legs for locomotion bid fair to go out of fashion. One man in a hundred thousand has become a millionaire, and is supposed to be happy, whilst a large proportion of the remainder of the hundred thousand are neither happy nor contented. The factory girls have exchanged the rosy cheeks of their grandmothers for fifteen shillings a week, and the workman of the mill earns as much in a week as his ancestor .at the plough tail earned in ten, and yet happiness seems as distant and as unreal to both as the far-off lake in a desert mirage to the weary wayfarer. May-day of old was a day of nn_rry dances and garlands of flowers. What will May-day, 1892, bt?

What is the reason of the discontent which, like the fly in the ointment, has so largely tainted the atmosphere of common life? Is it that the education we are providing is on wrong lines ? Has education got so lar as to teach that Cue will boil a potato, without explaining that it will also burn down a house ? Have we been so teaching our youth that the whole duty of man seems to be to win the race of life, regardless of the well-being of the other competitors ? Many of our American kinsfolk spend their lives in fierce struggles to get " on top," regardless of the crowds who " go under ;, and form the ruins of humanity over which their more successful competitors fight their way to fortune, if not to lame; Has this fierce competition of the shop and the market at last invaded our schools, so that not to " know " but to " win " is the chief object of school life? In such a ruthless race, is there room for love to man, for duty to God to be taught? In such an atmosphere, is consideration for others likely to be developed ?

Under such a system, materialism and selfishness'may be expected to dwarf the emotional and the noble elements of our nature. It is not therefore surprising that if the nineteenth century may be called an Age of Progress, with equal truth it may be styled the Age of Discontent. Vast combinations of employers on one side, and their workmen on the other, are engaged in fighting for what they call their rights, with no consideration for the other side. If, in consequence of such selfish tactics, woric becomes scarce, wages reduced and trade ruined, then, possibly a better state of things may follow, just as an obdurate soil will yield nothing till it has been torn to pieces with plough and harrow, when useful plants have a chance to yield a wholesome harvest.

Meantime, in the midst of the destructive turmoil, some well-wishers to their race, as we have said, have proposed Co-operation as one of many remedies which discussion may dis cover, and which necessity will enforce. It is true Co-operation aims no higher than an appeal to mutual self-interest, but that is very different from the brazen-faced selfishness of our time, which, to gain its ends, seeks to drown all cries, to crush all interests but its own. We do not suppose the advocates of Co-operation are ignorant of the difficulties in the way of its general adoption. They have so far im j t wilh many defeats and but lew succ< ss>.s. They may as well remember, however, that every good cause has f '^' ! - 1 similar exiierier.ee, haa pass" , ! thri...u'.::i the fire ot opposition and o flituiity defeat to final victory. -> ,;; operation hfive ihe Uili :ncUi -i it. position between the anvil oi sti.-j.i ■ . and the hammer oi siiifiahrusu vviii U c better prove its value. The "division of labour" ha« Income a necessity in our indiiPtiiai h\:*tern. Without it the development of our uinmif*<:ii!!"r s would have been impossible. What is now needed is a "division of proiiis.' This J3 the next stage oi dcvelnilienr, if o',;r industrial system is not to crumble in;o ruin by reason ot the spirit of discontent which peivades it. Co-operation to purchase and distribute commodities has been in full force on a large scale with very sue-1 cessful results in England. What we now require is co-cperation to p'oducs commodities on the sound basis of a i just division of profits. Whilst Societies of Distribution have flourished most in England, France stands at the head of all nations for Societies of Production, which have succeeded in a large number of cases. In the first instance, the French Government, after the Revolution of 1848, fell into the grave error of the State providing the capital for these Societies of Production, [t advanced three million francs to 56 co-operative societies. Three-fourths of these societies were complete failures after a brief period. The State lost its money and the workmen came to grief. The remainder re-organised themselves on sounder economic principles, still retaining the co-operative basis, and to-day, with many others, are highly successful undertakings. There are at least forty of these Societies of Production in Paris alone, some of them with 1,500 working members and half a million sterling of capital. Many of them, beginning with very little'capital, have proved the capacity of workmen to build up a business for themselves and become their own masters. The numerous failures in English co-operative Societies of Production have arisen from the breakdown when losses were made. Ho long as profits were made their division was easy. When losses were made their division was a different matter, and failure followed. Many, if not all, these failures resulted, we think, from the arrangement that the workmen were to be paid the full wages current and ten per cent, of the profits. As every manufacturing concern of necessity makes losses occasionally, unless some fund be provided to equalise dividends failure must follow when there is a losing year.

So far as we can see, success will attend co-operative enterprises when the workmen are content to receive " subsist ,: wages below those current in private enterprises, thus increasing the general profits, from which a reserve fund could be formed to cover the loss made in occasional bad years, and so equalising dividends that no year would be without its dividend. As many of our readers know, whaling enterprises were conducted on the cooperative or " lay " system. The owners provided the ship and all requisites, the captain, officers and crew supplied the skill and labour at much lower rates than were paid in ordinary ships. The owners and every man on board had their respective " Uys " —or shares of the profits—as may have been agreed upon before the whaling voyage commenced. In this way, a community ot interest was secured, and every man did his best because he was working for himself. On some such basis Co-operative Societies of Production may be expected to succeed.

In New Zealand, so far as we know, no attempts of note have been made hitherto to conduct any enterprise on sound co-operative principles. We therefore are disposed to welcome the efforts now being made by the Hod. Mr Seddon, Minister of Public Works, to construct railway earthworks on the co-operative system. Naturally he has met with determined opposition from contractors and their friends. So far as we can learn, the new departure promises to be a success.

There are now about 500 men employed on railway works in the North Island, and about the same number in

the South. The work is let in tracts to parties often men or thereal& each party electing a " deals with the Government charge of the work. We unife'rj&f the best workmen average abo'utfnj 2d per day, the lowest about the mean average daily about 7s 6d per man. The|wagf earned may seem high as compare! with, say, ploughmen's wages, but \ must be remembered that these work men are contractors, all working foj themselves, and on temporary jobs. , We shall watch with great interest Mr Seddon's attempt to introduce tbg co-operative system. If he succeedi he will have done not a little to solvt one of the burning questions e» (fc day.