The Eight Hours Question.

South Canterbury Times, Issue 6243, 16 June 1890, Page 3

The Eight Hours Question.

The question of the restriction of a day’s labour to eight hours continues to occupy a prominent position in the Press at Home. Mr Bradlaugh had an article on the subject in tho Fortnightly, pointing out the objections which he urged to the Legislature taking up the question. Another member of the House of Commons—Mr R. B. Haldane, the member for Haddington—takes a similar view. In an article in the Contemporary Review he urges that the interference of the Legislature would prove mischievous to the working people because it would take away one of the chief motives for combination, a means by which, he considers, the desired end could be more surely attained than by any number of Acts of Parliament. He gives as an instance in point the case of the Ssotch miners, who had combined with the puipose of securing better regulations as to hours of work and other matter. They had formed Unions, and were making good progress, until an agitation was got up to secure what was wanted by Parliamentary enactment. As the agitation for legislation gained strength the popularity and influence of the Unions diminished, and it was with much difficulty that they were kept from disbanding, a consummation that was only averted by a movement for a rise in wages. “If the Unions are to be kept in efficient condition,” remarks Mr Haldane, “ they must be left plenty to do, and if we remove from them the responsibility of seeing to the adjustment of hours part of their bread of life will have been taken from them.” Mr Haldane cites tho case of the dock laborers strike as an instance of the power of well-organised combination. “This victory,” he says, “of unskilled labor, struggling under the least favorable circumstances against a great and powerful capitalist organisation, has strengthened the hands of the opponents of an Eight Hours Bill more than anything which has happened for many a long day. If so much could be done by the poorest workers, enfeebled by their poverty, possessing at the outset as the story of the movement as we know it shows—no real organisation, pressed from outside by competitors for their places, and devoid alike of the high average of intelligence and the accumulated resources which have enabled other combinations to succeed, bow much more may not be done when the conditions are favourable to the laborer ?” Mr Haldane considers that there can be no doubt whatever that the hours of labour should, as far as practicable, bo so shortened as to enable the worker not only to preserve health _ and strength, but to have leisure to recruit his bodv and develop the mind. That is a point upon which, he thinks, there can be no disagreement. The only controversy is about tho means of attaining that end. As we have already stated, his contention is that combination would be far more effectual than legislation, but he suggests that Parliament might give its assistance by resolution of tho House of Commons requiring the Government, as a large employer of labour, to set an example of the restriction of labour to eight hours in all public works. But even in this instance he thinks combination by the workmen would be preferable to Parliamentay interference. “ There is sometimes reason to think, ”ho says, “ that,certain officials take the view that the Government workmen are in the position, not of ordinary workmen, but of subordinate officials, who ought not to combine and bargain at arm’s length with their employers in the usual way. If there is any such opinion abroad it may be well believed that it ought to be got rid of. On the balance of advantages and disadvantages it is probably beat that the Government should negotiate with the Trades Unions in the ordinary way. If so there is no reason why the hours of labour in its employment should not be regulated in the customary fashion, the great employer being, if necessary, reminded of its obligations to society by a'vote of the Commons who control it. But this is very different from saying that there ought to be legislation, or that the privileges of Government workmen should be different fr.-m those of other workmen.” With regard to the coalminers, Mr Haldane says: “The result of the evidence taken appears to be that there is practically no compulsion to work for more than eight hours, except in a few pits in the west of Scotland, and that the difficulty there could be got rid of by the Unions themselves with a little effort. There is in fact, great division of opinion as to the expedienov of any legislation, and it appears that the real object of those who are in favour of it is not pimply to regulate the hours of labour, but to raise wages by making the output of coal the monopoly of a certain class. If the question is put to the country whether, under these circumstances, it will sanction this policy, or leave the hours of labour to be efficiently regulated, as experience show they can be, and nearly always are, by the Unions, the answer ought hardly to be doubtful.” In concluding this article Mr Haldane says : “ The history of the world, and not least of our own country, shows that time may bring about tho greatest changes, and bring them about by the gentlest means. It may be that failure and disappointment would be the consequence of an Eight Hours Act, but it does not follow that, because such a policy will not auoeed, the order of things against which it is directed will remain, merely by reason that the policy has not receiued effect.”