UP TO EMPLOYERS

Evening Post, Volume CVI, Issue 141, 18 December 1928, Page 9

UP TO EMPLOYERS

TO SAY THE NEXT WORD INDUSTRIAL PEACE MOVE POSITION IN BKITAIN United Press Association—fly Electric Telegraph—Copyright. "Times" Cables. (Received ISth December, 10 a.m.) LONDON, 17th December. "Tho Times," in a leader on industrial co-operation, emphasising the fact that within a day or two employers will be meeting to examine the question of industrial co-operation, recalls that just a year has elapsed since Lord Melchett launched his proposal, but whereas the Trades Union Congress publicly debated and approved the scheme in September, the employers are meeting in private, leaving the public uninformed concerning the nature and force of the arguments influencing their action regarding the paramount industrial question. Hitherto two employers' associations, although reciprocating the desire for a better uuderstaudiug, arc not permitted by that constitution to undertake such negotiations, but a method of linking them will be found, if tho purpose of the negotiations is approved. "Perhaps the employers have a lingering suspicion of the trades unionists' intentions, but the only proof of a change of heart is a change of practico and habit which the trades unions gave by the adoption of tlio policy, of ■ co-operation. "Meanwhile tho interim report, pubished in July, on the result of the employers' and trade unionists' unofficial discussions, indicates a joint desire for co-operation, but it is incomplete if the movement is whittled down to an im iprovoment in the machinery dealing with disputes, and the incentive will largely evaporate. Whole-hearted cooperation is the need to-day, but the word making co-operation an early- and hopeful experiment has at this stage to be spoken by the employers."