THE BURNLEY DISPUTE.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 21264, 19 February 1931, Page 8

THE BURNLEY DISPUTE.

It will be easily understood that, as was stated in the cable message which we published this week, the settlement of the cotton mills dispute at Burnley, Lancashire, has caused intense relief. There could scarcely have been a time more unpropitious than the present for an interruption of work in the cotton industry. Apart altogether from the Burnley trouble, upwards of 30 per cent, of those dependent on the cotton industry for their livelihood are out of work, and it was stated a few weeks ago that, as a result of the depression in trade, some 350,000 looms are stand-

ing idle in Great Britain. The Bumley dispute is one of long and had been the subject of negotiation between employers and workers , for many months before, early in January, all labour was withdrawn from the mills in the district, with the consequence that 4000 workers were deprived of employment. The principal ground for disaffection on the part of the employees was the “more looms experiment,” which had been in operation for nearly two years for investigation purposes. The schema provided for the operation by a worker of more than the number of looms, four to six, that has been sanctioned by; custom. The employers claimed that the application of the more looms system to certain branches of the industry Would bring about a saving of production costs so large as would strengthen the competitive position of the industry and lead to an expansion > of trade. The trades union objection was stated to be that labour would be displaced by the introduction of the system, that a proposed new method of calculating earnings was unsatisfactory, and that women workers would physically be unequal to the task of operating eight looms. It is probably the case that there was something to be said on both sides. Where an industry is dependent almost for its continued existence upon its ability to reiduce costs of production and thus win back markets that have been lost to foreign competitors, it would be most if it were prevented by stubborn and unreasoning opposition from introducing methods that would enable it to achieve this end. The fact that the mill-owners were willing to introduce the new system gradually and that a revision of wages would \ enable greater earnings to ba made suggests that the operatives’ objections to the proposed change were very deeply rooted. And apparently . it is hoped that these may be overcome or modified in the improved atmos- y. phere .that will be created through the resumption of work. In the meantime, the employers have withdrawn the lockout and discontinued their looms experiment, presumably because I they cannot afford, at such a time, ho have their mills lying idle.