CORRESPONDENCE

Evening Post, Volume CXXI, Issue 36, 12 February 1936, Page 10

CORRESPONDENCE

FORTY^HOUR WEEK

(To the Editor.)

Sir,—As is usual with all questions qf reform the 40-hour week is causing considerable consternation in the f.amps, and that, without due consideration of the question in all its ramifications. Time was when factory workers worked from 6 a.m. to 7.30 p.m., and any reference to an eighthour day suggested bankruptcy in many minds; but the eight-hour day became an accomplished fact without an inflation of bankruptcy returns. In the 90's shops were kept open till 8 or 9 p.m., and up to midnight on Saturday; and there was the general talk of ruining the trade, but everybody apparently survived it. Then the Saturday half-holiday was brought into, effect. This was supposed to create stark ruin to everyone. But again the croakers were wrong, and business went on as usual.

At a time when unemployment is so severe, it is a matter of national necessity, as well as equity, that the hours of labour should be reduced to a level giving employment to all. To argue otherwise is to deny some of our fellow men the right to work. Very well, then, if that doctrine is to obtain, industry must be prepared to provide those denied work, with a wage capable of supporting them in. decency as befits a human being, instead of on such a degrading scale as obtained in the past; and industry will foot the bill.

- One strong point put forward against the proposal is the probable increase in costs. If we look at the factory statistics for 1930, we find that the aggregate average labour cost of all the industries enumerated works out at just under 16.5 per cent. Now, consider just what that means. The worker whose labour produces the goods gets £16 10s per cenU the nonproducers get £83 10s per cent, amongst them. Surely there is something radically wrong in a system which allows of such an inequality of the division of the products. And it is to this latter element that both the Government and employers need to look to with a view to reducing costs. It is a matter of complete reorganisation. Unless—and until unemployment is completely wiped out, the stigma of inefficiency, indifference, apathy, and inhumanity must forever rest upon the shoulders of all those who are in the most remote degree responsible for the position, or, who are capable of assisting in its removal, and refuse or neglect to do it. Of the various reforms carried out in the past, as mentioned above, how many of our shopkeepers would vote for the old regime of go-as-you-please; and how many would vote to abolish the Saturday half-holiday? It is all a matter of organisation, and for employers to talk as they are now doing is to belittle their own power of organisation. Instead, let'them welcome the change which heralds the prospect of a better future, and pull their weight in order to assist the Government in its effort <to restore equilibrium.—l am, etc..

W. MADDISON.

[The correspondent does not give the source of the statistics in which he bases his statement: "The worker, whose labour produces the goods gets £16 10s per cent.; the non-producers get £83 10s per cent, amongst them." The latest factory production statistics available show that there is no such unequal division of the products. For 1933-34 the value of factory output was £71,770,872, cost of materials £46,919,----193,' wages and salaries,' £12,106,500, other expenses (coal, power, insurance, depreciation, etc.) £8,257,261. Into the cost of materials and the provision of fuel and power, labour charges, of course, enter largely. Certainly the proportion of the, output which goes in payment for materials and power cannot be roughly classified as taken by the "non-producers."—Ed.]