POLITICIAN ABROAD

New Zealand Times, Volume XXXIII, Issue 7970, 29 November 1911, Page 9

POLITICIAN ABROAD

AN ENGLISH VISITOR BRITISH PARLIAMENTARIAN IN NEW ZEAXAND. VIEWS ON LABOUR MATTERS, Mr Theodore Cooko Taylor, Liberal member for the Radoiiffe-cum Farnworth division of Lancashire in the British House of Commons, is visiting New Zealand, and is at present staying at Rotorua. Mr Taylor is the head of a big firm of woollen, manufacturers at Homo, and has been visiting Sydney, from ■whence he came to tho Dominion- He i& a leading exponent of the princil>le of profit-sharing, which he not only preaches, but practises in bis own business employing KOO work people. He takes a leading part in the anti-opium movement, in Hie interest of which he went to China in 1907. Mr Taylor was aa interested member of the audience at one of Sir Joseph Ward's meetings in tho north, and took tho opportunity of heartily congratulating tho Prim© Minister upon his broad minded and far-seeing views on the Im porial questions dealt with during the speech. “One of the reasons that brings me to Australia/' Mr Taylor said in aa interview in Sydney recently, “is that i may study your labour conditions on the spot. The legislatures of Australasia havo gen© much further than those in any other country, and we in England, who make a study of social economics, aro watching the course of things in Australia and Now Zealand with the deepest interest. Our Wagoo Board law passed two years ago relates only to a limited number of industries, and is being applied with great care, and, I believe, some success, by tho boards thus far set up. At Home there is a general desire to establish labour conditions, not only more permanent in thoir character, but more favourable to tho worker than those which at present prevail, and I have not the least doubt that out of the recent railway trouble will como a considerable improvement in the lot of tho underpaid railway men. X fancy, moreover, that ths troubles will kelp on the cause of the natioualisation of the British and Irish railways. STUDYING LABOUR CONDITIONS. “Coming to tho wider question of tho relations between private employers and companies and their employees, much unrest admittedly exists. 1 It is caused partly by tho higher cost of living, resulting from tho recent increased production of gold and economies in its use. But it largely originates also in the natural desire of tho many for a greater share of th© wealth now enjoyed by the comparatively few. I have long held that wise statesmanship,, as well as a sense of justice, should dispose employers generally to recognise this by some form of profit-sharing. It of course, well known that Sir ‘William Le\er adopted this principle some two years ago. It has existed in Franco for two generations past, and where tried under fair conditions has been uniformly successful. The most striking examples are afforded by largo British gas companies, led in the first instance by, Sir George Xlvesey, chairman of the South Metropolitan Company, which for some fifteen years was the only on© to practise the principle. This company's example. however, has of late years been followed by twenty or-thirty-others in Gnat Britain, and in that industry the principle has without a doubt been firmly and permanently established. VIEWS ON PROFIT-SHARING. “fn my own case I havo all my adult life had a desire to put th© principle into practice. The opportunity came in 1892, when, by tho death and retirement of other partners, X became the head of a large woollen manufacturing business at Batley, in Yorkshire. I adopted with modifications what it is right to call the Godin method, as practised by the large firm beating that name at Guise, in France. My scheme applies to the net profits of. every financial .year. Alter the year's expenses are paid, and proper depreciation reckoned upon ail wasting assets, interest upon capital at tho rate jof a per cent, is the first charge upon such profit ae the year's balance-sheet shows. After that capital and labour each participates at the same rate per cent. That is to say. tho. dividend is apportioned to the total capital and the total amount paid lor labour during the year on an equal footing. Tim idea 2* that as the first charge upon the business is for labour, periodically during tho year, so tho next charge ifl simple interest on the wages of capital and that thereafter labour and capital should be regarded as having a common claim upon tbi profits.” , „ Mr Taylor cited an instance., lake, he said, "a business employing, say, £120,000 capital, and paying, say, £BO,OOO in wages and salaries during the year. Let us suppose the net profits to be divided in a given year amount to £16,000. Under my scheme tho nrst charge unon these profits would bo £6OOO - that is," 5 per cent, interest on the capital of £120,000. For the purpose of further distribution- the £BO,OOO paid during tho year in wages would bo added to tin. £120,000, making a total of £200,000, over which tho remaining £IO,OOO profit would be distributed os a bonus to labour of 5 per cent., and a further dividend to capital of 5 per cent. In that year, therefore, labour would receive wages, and 5 por cent, bonus in addition and capital would receive a total of 10 per cent. If the profit were only £6OOO, capital would get only 5 por cent., and labour nothing beyond wages. If, say, £36,000 were tbo profit divided, capital would get 20 per cent., and labour 15 per cent., in addition to. wages. That is, labour gets the same dividend in addition to wages that capital gets in addition to interest. SCHEME A GREAT SUCCESS.

“To all who havo been in our employ the whole year w© pay tho labour bonus

in now shares in the company, tho future dividends on which are paid in cash. The labour bonus payable on wages to people who have not 4 been the whole year in our employ is placed to the credit of a workers' benefit fund, and strictly devoted in various ways to the benefit of the employees, "The workers’ shares do not carry control of the business, but, in respect oi dividends, and in case of winding-up the company, have the same financial lights as my own. "1 began over nineteen, years ago with the managers of the business, then the foreman, and soon extended tho scheme t> all our workers. Only those in the employ of tho company can hold our shares, so that when a man wants to sell his shaves he must dispose of them to some other employee. A small minority of our workers made a practice of selling their shares as soon as they got them. Throe years ago we stopped that practice, and at tho same time began to give double* bonus to ail those who had been five years in tho employ of the company, were twenty-one years of age, and had retained shares to the extent of half a year's wages. Of our 1400 workpeople 1100 have been shareholders for years past. Tho scheme has been a thorough success, and though I may or may not be so rich as I should otherwise have been, I feel that, in respect of those things lhat are worth more than money, 1 have'-been a great gainer/*