UNEMPLOYMENT

Press, Volume LXIV, Issue 13017, 20 January 1908, Page 7

UNEMPLOYMENT

DISCUSSION AT A LABOUR CONFERENCE.

CHARITY CONDEMNED.

TJaitad Prws AißocUticn—Bj El«ctr„ T»le_r»p_—Copjright

LON_oN, January 18

The majority of the delegates attending the Labour Party's Conference at Hull were present at a special conference with the trade union and socialist co-operative organisations on the unemployed question. Mr P. F. Cumin, M.P. for Jorrow, presided. He said thit the £200,000 granted for relief purposes was a mere drop in the ocean. Ho would not accept Government philanthropy or help under charity conditions. So long aa the law of private enterprise was the guiding principle of th© world's industry ami commerce they would always have unemployed. 'ihev would not solve tho question until they curtailed the incomes of tbe rich, who were an imposition, and thereby added to the tucomes of the poor. They desired legislation to prevent chaos and ruin that would follow the uprising of the people crying for bread Mr Ramsay Macdonald protested agarust the habii of voting money in a panic. He moved a resolution declaring that unemployment was not caused by free trade and not averted by periods of good trade, but was a permanent feature of the present industrial organisation. The resolution also urged the vigorous use of legislative and administrative powers, including the shortening of hours of labour of public and other employees, end the protection of th© worker a-guiinst tlie operation oS land otnd other monopolies, and called upon tho Government to fulfil the promise mad© in the King's Speech in 1906 to amend the Unemployed Act. The resolution set forth that such amendment, to be satisfactory, must embody the principles of the Labour Party's Bill. Mr J. O'Grady, member for Leeds. in seconding the resolution, said the Queen's Unemployed Fund, though promoted by a woman with a big heart, had done more real damage to common manhood among the unemployed than anything during tha last twenty years. It degraded and demoralised them. Protection as a remedy against unemployment wtae rabsurd. To rest only on free tirade was doubly absurd. Several delegates advised caution, lest the rest of th© Labour cause should be weakened. Th© resolution was carried with enthusiasm. A surely socialist amendment was negatived.