UNDER-EMPLOYMENT

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume LXIII, Issue 18992, 17 April 1936, Page 3

UNDER-EMPLOYMENT

INDUSTRY IN BRITAIN CASUALISATION OF I. • ■; TURNOVER OF JOi:,S LUXDON. Feb. 14. "There is little doubt that there is a -rowing tendency on the part of employers of labour in many trades ami industries towards cutting down their permanent stalls to a nucleus ol keymen and applying to the Employment Exchange for additional hands as anU when required." writes Major B. I. Kevnolds in the Contemporary Review. ''•Anybody who has had the experience of running a . factory knows this practice has its inconveniences,' states Major Reynolds. -'The rhythm of an industrial plant and. in consequence. Us efficiency is liable to be disturbed by any large influx of fresh labour. But in times of depression managers are forced to consider their costs, including labour. ■erv carefully. Simultaneously, they are driven to overhaul their organisation anil machine technique.

INFLUENCE OF THE MACHINE • It, is obviously difficult to produce ligores. but there'is no doubt that one of the elfects of the recent hard turn's has been to bring about, a considerable increase in the technical and administrative efficiency of factories and plants, and i.hat this has been accomplished try a corresponding increase in the casualisaliou of labour. 'The only conclusion that one can draw is that a very considerable proportion of the working population Ol lilt country, 'perhaps as much as oneIhird, consists of people possessing no special skill or training and who arc not attached by any well-defined ties to :,' particular employer, company or place ~!' work. Many of them are not oven iltached to a 'particular industry, I hey constitute a pool of labour, which is drawn on by industry when required, As signing on at the Employment Exchange is a condition of drawing unemployment insurance benelit, or even selief 'we can take it that the live regisler gives a fairly complete picture of the Inlioui- unused and available throughout the country at any given moment. But, although industry" is making increasing use of'the network of Employment Exchanges, and the Ministry of Labour r:1 „ „ow claim that it is effecting the enormous total of two million odd pipings each year, the fact remains that this onlv represents some 25 per cent ol the total annual turn-over ol jobs. "A high proportion of the Ministry s placings, too, consist of men in the . killed"and semi-skilled' categories. Unskilled labour still fends for itself to a o-reat extent. It may lie that some employers still prefer to pick their men from applicants presenting themselves at their gates, as. of course, they are perfectly entitled to do; but, from the wider point of view, there would appear to be no question that a more general use of the official job-placing agency would produce greater administrative efficiency arid, in all probability, a more rapid turnover with a consequent lowering in the ■unemployment figures.

BETWEEN ONE -TOR AND THE NEXT "lint, even with the maximum attainable efficiency it scans inevitable that, for auv foreseeable time to come, there will be hundreds of thousands of men who will have lo spend varying spells of days, weeks and months between one job and' the next. In an earlier age the ideal of a more leisurelv society based on agriculture and handicrafts might have b «en 'A place for everyone, and everyone in his place. ■ "To-day a considerable turnover of jobs even amongst skilled and semiskilled workers, and something like a pool of labour containing the great hulk of the unskilled, appear to be inseparable adjuncts of our highly mechanised and rapidly changing industrial civilisation. Better trade conditions and an improvement in our Employment 'Exchange technique may speed up the turnover ~nd reduce the size of the pool, hut they w j|| not eliminate either. "If (he ultimate test of a civilisation is (.he extent to which if offers all its citizens the opportunity of living some kind of a life and of developing their faculties to the fullest possible extent iis some of us still persist in believing —then we must not be surprised to •;ind that, from the point; of view ol many who find themselves in the pool ol labour to-flay. our civilisation is Pol proving itself an nmpialilied success ••One has only to go amongst them ~„,] learn something of the. conditions of their lives to see how 'under-einploy• mmi' hangs like a fog over them, blotling out the vision of any kind ol opportunity. How lo dispel that fog is one ol the most pressing problem* ol our lime." ■ .