IN BRITAIN TODAY Pakistanis’Part In 'Wooltown'

Press, Volume CVIII, Issue 31762, 20 August 1968, Page 18

IN BRITAIN TODAY Pakistanis’Part In 'Wooltown '

Capital investment and the employment of immigrant (Pakistani) workers in the British wool textile industry are linked, and the employment of immigrants has probably slowed down the rate of contraction within the industry.

These are two points made In a study of the employment of immigrants in the wool industry carried out by Mr B. G. Cohen, a senior research officer at the Institute of Race Relations, and Mr P. J. Jenner, an assistant lecturer in social administration at the London School of Economics. Their findings, based on a study of “Wooltown,” a large West Riding town where the wool industry has been the main employer for more than 150 years, are contained in an article in the latest issue of “Race,” the journal of the Institute of Race Relations. The authors approached 24 firms in the wool textile industry and attempted to answer three main questions: What was the effect of immigrant labour on investment policies?

What the actions of the employers might have been if the immigrants had not been available?

How did immigrant labour compare with local labour?

The article says: “It would be fair to conclude that the employment of immigrants has facilitated new capital investment in the sample firms which were studied. This is because the new machinery is too expensive to be worked only 40 to 48 hours each week, and it must be employed as intensively as possible, thus necessitating shift work.”

The authors suggest that this is a trend not confined to the wool industry and one which may welt in the future, make headway in more • white-collar” occupations. Immigrant (Pakistani) workers, most of whom were single adult males, were willing to work as long hours as possible to earn as much as possible. “It is probable that in the absence of Pakistani immigrants there would have been a rise in the wage level of the industry but the degree of this rise is problematical, and its scope would have been limited probably by the ability of the employers to

'pass on higher costs to consumers,” says the article. The authors suggest that because the room for manoeuvre of any individual employer in the industry to raise prices is very small, the present contraction of the industry would probably have been much swifter but for the presence of immigrant labour. Disaster Plan The Government is considering a proposal that £l-a-year “Disaster Insurance” policies be made available to the public through post offices to cover emergency payments on damaged property and furniture. The plan has been put forward by a Labour M.P. in ♦alks with the Minister of Housing (Mr Anthony Greenwood), and the Government now plans to discuss it with insurance companies. Mr William Wilkins, M.P. for Bristol South, made the proposal after hundreds of I his constituents had lost proi perty worth more than SNZI.2m. during the severe i flooding of last May. The Government paid out ! compensation of about 5NZ350.000. j Mr Wilkins believes that at I least half of Britain’s house- : holders would take part in i such a scheme, and the result would be a national disaster fund of between SNZIOm. and SN.Z.2Om. The Ministry is looking at the possibility of insurance companies forming a pool to operate such a scheme, with Government backing. Stamp Thefts A special unit to deal with I thefts of stamps has been established by Scotland Yard. The unit is now compiling a central registry of the stamp thefts that have taken place during the last five years and the methods of operation used by thieves, as well as of photographs and catalogues. A reference library covering forged stamps has been begun and methods of stamp

identification are being studied.

The registry is understood to have disclosed so far that at least £500,000 worth of stamps has been stolen in Britain and Europe over the last five years. Recoveries in the period are valued at only £14,000. The two major difficulties said to be facing stamp theft investigators is the ease with which stamps can be smuggled out of a country and the difficulty of tracing them. Scotland Yard plans to keep in close touch with the stamp squad at Interpol headquarters in Paris, and has sought the co-operation of philatelists and stamp dealers. It hopes to persuade dealers and collectors to have their most valuable stamps photographed so that they can be “noted” in the Yard’s registry. Plan Opposed The League of Anglican Loyalists is threatening to split the Church of England if the present scheme of unity with the Methodist Church is pursued. In a statement addressed to the Archbishop of Canterbury, the league says it deplores the “ambiguity and compromise” contained in the scheme. i “We consider the propositions contained in the final report to be contrary to the tradition and catholic principles of the Church of England, and regret that no provision has been made in the scheme for the laity to express its mind,” the statement says. In support of its position, the league makes these three points about unity: “Any scheme must be in accordance with the Holy Scriptures and the traditional teachings of the Universal Church as expressed in Holy Communion and marriage discipline. “There must be full acceptance of the traditional sacramental order of bishops, priests and deacons as laid down in the Common Book of Prayer. “Acceptance of the teaching of the Universal Church, with regard to the Sacraments, as necessary to salvation."

The league also says that confirmation, penance and unction of the sick should be included in any union scheme.

Gap Widened Britain's trade deficit, which widened by £3om. between June and July to £Bom. appears to have blown away recent euphoria and revived the belief that it is going to be a long, long wait for a surplus. The economics editor of “The Times,” Peter Jay, says that in spite of the still reasonable possibility that the trade deficit will come into line with the Chancellor’s Budget forecast by the end of this year, the immediate position of a very heavy deficit, coupled with the rise in unemployment to 2.5 per cent in July, places the Government in “a seemingly cruel dilemma.” “The unemployment trend rules out deflation even to

curb imports,” Mr Jay writes. “The trade deficit rules out deflation to reduce unempolyment.

“To break the deadlock by introducing import controls would mean running the already considerable risk of triggering off a world-wide spiral of protectionist measures, as each Government scrambled to insulate itself from the effects of each other’s restrictions. “In this situation, the Government is likely to sit tight and hope that an improvement in the trade position will bring the stimulus to home production it needs to mop up excessive unemployment." Computer Aid Archaeologists digging to find the Court of King Arthur have laid down their picks and shovels to make way for a computer. The electronic brain being used in the search for Camelot, where Arthur and his knights jousted and junketed, should be able to pin-point just where they should excavate on South Cadbury Hill, Somerset. Mr John Wilcox, a computer programmer, who is also an archaeologist, obtained permission from his firm to use a K.D.F. “brain” in the dig. “The results have been impressive,” he says. “The great advantage is that archaeological data which used to take hours to work out arithmetically can now be processed in seconds.” The computer can point out features of the site such as post-holes, walls, and foundation trenches. Price War The price war between Britain’s air charter companies and regular airlines continues unabated, with the public unable to make the most of the cheap Continental holidays tour operators could make available if there was no dispute. The over-all point of issue arises from the fact that the tour operators must keep their all-inclusive holiday charges roughly on a par with fares charged by the regular airlines. And that requirement has led to what one Fleet Street writer has described as “an Alice in Wonderland situation.”

For example, one of Britain's major holiday tour operators has decided that by using chartered aircraft he could offer an 11-day, allinclusive holiday in Jugoslavia next summer for the equivalent of about SNZ7O, but for the fact that the all-in price is lower than the scheduled air fare between England and Jugoslavia. The requirement for holiday operators to keep their prices up to scheduled air fares comes from the International Air Transport Association, which lays down fares on international routes and sets them at prices which will cover periods of low sales.

The association has often pointed out that scheduled airlines run regular services and their fares must take account of occasions when aircraft are flown less than half full.

The charter companies, on the other hand, operate their aircraft only when payment for a full load is guaranteed: and they frequently obtain their aircraft second hand at prices far below the original.

The board of trade insists that Britain’s tour operators stick to the I.A.T.A. rules, but the holiday operators protest that those rules are not universally observed. They claim that their counterparts in Europe's two other all-inclusive tour regions, Germany and Scandinavia, are not being held to them. New Zealanders taking advantage of their services have been surprised to find that the cost of a twoweek holiday in Italian resorts south of Naples, including flights both ways by Comet jet, a first-class beachside hotel, and three meals a day can cost less that the British airlines scheduled day return air fare between London and Rome, a much shorter distance.