BRITISH ENGINEERS.

Otago Witness, Issue 3549, 28 March 1922, Page 17

BRITISH ENGINEERS.

DISCUSSION IN THE COMMONS. LONDON, March 20. Mr J. R. Clynes moved the adjournment of the House in order to raise the question of the engineering lock-out with the object of inducing the Government to take steps to terminate the dispute. The lockout, he said, amounted to astonishing aggression on the part of the employers. He condemned their action m refusing to consult the men regarding working overtime as autocratic. Workmen could no longer allow Capital the sole right to conduct the t workshops in its own wav. It opened a i new era, Undisputed authority on the 1 part of the employers of industry without restraint meant enslavement, i Mr Gould (U.) maintained that the men’s claim distinctly interfered with the managerial rights of the employers. The efforts to revive trade were being killed by the intolerable conditions which the men sought to impose. The ballot taken j was a travesty, as 50,000 men determined

whether 380,000 would work or not. Mr Clynes, continuing, said that the greatest mistake the Government made was its failure to see that the trade union ballot was conducted honestly. Mr Robert Young urged that they should not darken the debate with references to the Soviet control of workshops. If some of the engineers were Bolshevists, the employers and Parliament were responsible. Every promise made had been repudiated. The natural objection to overtime was that thousands of engineers were unemployed. Mr Austin Hopkinson said it was ludicrous for members of the Employers’ Federation to claim managerial functions when they abdicated the same by joining the Federation. Only employers like himself, who were outside the federation, could really control their own works, lie did not think an Industrial Court could usefully decide the question of overtime, which no employers wanted if it were avoidable. Dr T. J. Macnamara (Minister of Labour), replying, said that he was profoundly disappointed that his efforts at mediation were unsuccessful. Since January there had been a reduction of 152,000 in the number of unemployed, but there were still 1,792,000 without work. It was impossible to put the Industrial Courts’ Act into force while ballots were progressing in 47 trade unions. The unions themselves would have resented such intervention if the employers had demanded it. He appealed to both sides to compose their differences. Sir Allan Smith, chairman of the managing committee of the Engineering Employers’ Federation, said that the difficulty of the employers was that they had to deal with 72 trade unions. If the unions conceded the principle that the employers had a right to manage their own factories, the employers would he pleased to confer with the men regarding the manner in which the managerial functions would operate. The employers did not want to smash the unions. The motion was negatived by 162 to 80. NEGOTIATIONS TO BE RESUMED. LONDON, March 24. The shipbuilding and engineering trades’ ballot rejected the employers’ terms by 164,7.59 votes to 49,503. The Engineering and Shipbuilding Federation has decided to advise all affiliated members to cease work on Tuesday until the result of the ballot on the bonus cut is known. A later message states that negotiations in the engineering dispute will be resumed on Monday. March 25. The engineering situation is more hopeful. The employers and the unions have agreed to resume negotiations on Monday. The lock-out notices will probably be withdrawn while the negotiations proceed.