HOW TO DEAL WITH THE UNEMPLOYED.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 4576, 22 February 1893, Page 1

HOW TO DEAL WITH THE UNEMPLOYED.

ME- JOHN BtJBNS* REFORM BI&L. {Vitoieta-tif Eimeuis.) England has indeed good cause to "be tproud of her working 'men, not merely as 'workmen but statesmen. The papers x w/ittenbyMr Burb and John Burce in the Nineteenth' Century are admirable illustrations of the intellectual power, literary 1 ability, and practical sagacity which are to •be found in those who have earned their 1 daily bread in the factory and the mine. ■ John Burns is a genius. Before 'he ends his career bb the Syndic of London he will probably have served in more than one ' Cabinet as a Minister of the Crown. A PAIPABLB BIOT. I say this all the more readily beoauee I do not agree, with all that he says in this article, and in one respect, at .least, it is disfigured by a blot whioh John Burns will live to regret. It is a good thing to be zealous in good works, but it is not a good , .thing, to growl at any one else who endeavours to do the same kind of work which you are doing with anch apparatus as lies ready to his hand. Nothing could be more mistaken and unfortunate than the attempt to which Mr Burns in this article lends, himself to hold up to public odium those who are using private or religious effort to. cope with great evils which •au deplore. This is -especially wanton when, as in the case of General Booth and Mr Arnold White, they have irom the first made it moat unmistakably clear that they were forced reluctantly to < take up the question by the refusal of organised society, either national or municipal, to cope with the problem: No One would be more glad than General Booth to ■ see the whole of bis social work undertaken by .properly constituted municipa or national authorities. John Burns should have been the last man in the world to have thrown a stone; at ithe religious leader, who, in the face of immense opposition on the part of the more strictly religious people, insisted' with a voice whioh rung throughout the rworld, 1 upon < using • every means to alleviate the hard lot of the out-of-workfli ; • • : . THB INDtTBTBIALrAaiDBOHEDA. Barring this most unneoeßsary disfigurement, John Burns' article is avvery masterly production. It has as its keynote the hoarse whisper' of the prisoner in the ezeroißing yard of Peritonville Gaol, who said to his fellow-criminal?- "Stick to the unemployed, John ! Work is ' our only hope." How to cope with the ever-recur-ring problem of now to find profitable employment for men who seek work and find none, ia the perennial difficulty with which Mr Bnrns essays to deal. Nor is it with man Only, for, aa Mr Bnrna finely" ' Bays/the position of a workleas woman or girl in a oity of great distances is even more pathetic than that, of the unemployed male worker. : . ' , Vt " Before her the workhouaeor the street, she bravely suffers in' silence, and has no alternative to starvation but the eating of the crumb of charity or the loaf of lust. The industrial Andromeda that want of work has chained to a life ahe loathes incarnates all the poignant sorrow and desperation of the merciless struggle for existence amongst the poor,* against which virtue, honour, and labour fight often in vain. ■ .'■-,. ■■"' ■'■.- ' '■'■■' ■'■' ;.' ■ '■' ' Every one will agree with ' John Burns when he says that relief by:'finding work : for the workleSs is the best mode of relief.' But how to find it ia the problem. MB BURNS* SOLTTMON. i John Burns' solution is summarised by >. himself as follows :— "Absorption of the unemployed by general rednotion of hours, this {followed by ' munioipalißation of industry and nationali- >. aation of monopolies, is the line ' hi least resistance for all. It is regulation or ziot, v reduction or revolution." 1 He explains in detail how he hopes to attain the means by which he believes ? the problem could be Bolved. . AN EIGHT HOUEB* DAY AND WO OVER- ; TIME. ' ' ' ' : . .He would have first and foremost a com- , pnlsory eight hours' day. By this means lie thinkß an enormous number of the • unemployed could be absorbed. On * tha railways alone an eight hours* day would help 100,000 men, a somewhat significant statement when taken together withrhis ■ own, figures, which state that the railway , employees number 200,000 men. /At this rat 9 each of these men must be working - twelve hours a day. MUNICIPALISE LABOUtt. In the General Post Office the stoppage of overtime would secure the employment o? eight hundred more men. In addition to - thiaatoppage of overtime and the redaction of the. hours of work of the individual, he would, as far as possible, substitute permanent for casual labour, by transferring ; as much work as possible from contractors . and private companies to public bodies. He would alao, as far as possible, endeavour to equalise the employment, and keepsthe i, hands busy all the year round. . ESTABLISH LABOTTE, BUREAUX. The first thing to do, however, is to •find , out how many unemployed there are, and who they are. Mr Burns would establish . completely equipped labour bureaux in .. every district council or vestry area, and • would establish it under the charge of « .competent official in the local town hall. These bureaux should be in telegraphic ,or telephonic communication with each ' other throughout the country through a Central Labotfr Exchange and Imperial ] labour Bureau, which would utiliuo 18,000 post offices for ascertaining and .exchanging the various different local . needs. ' BEpiKF COMMITTBSS. • Pending th c formation of these Labour ■JBuieapc, he would eßfcablieh a -relief Comtjaittee*^ in each County Council area, on i!Which representatives of the' Trade Union *, 'Charity Organisation Society. jFriendly : Societies, temperance and other bodies rshould Bit, and, impossible, supplemented Iby a number of the guardians and -vestrymen, whose local (knowledge, together vwifch. that of the workmen, would be of orresfc service in differentiating the workers tfroai the loafers— a necessary aad iadisipeneable task.' This Committee should .confine itself 6o disbnrs&g relief ia money vor food only to those who, through illness <or .inability to work,, should have relief, jand who refuse to go io&o the worthou&e loooause'tbeir distress waaonly temporary. 3&is unofficial <body w«uld undertake temporarily the duties that should fall upsa new iDiatriet and Poor Law Councils! thfifc Bhooid soon be created on the, broadest .possible franchise (for this acid other puupooeg:" BBfIPLTS. . . , Any .subscriptions for the relief of tbe able-bodied .poor shoved be handed over to the loecl authorities, whose surveyor or ' engineer should employ the unemployed ia cleaneiLag'ian.d sanitation, and oecesaary public wicirfcs.. !Ko man should he employed unless he had at (least resided three in t&e district, and no man should tba employed fall time. Mr Bcrns thinks tbat itke Government could lend money on .easy •terms, and ia many instances make a eon--tritution to tiie' uneaployed* although in •other respects each locality .should be responsible for ifca own oat-ofc- works. Mr /Kacnß cays that bethinks if all the local Authorities acted upon Mr Fowjer's circular, followed the example of the London County Council, and employed the unem--I>toyed at the rate at which Chelsea employed thene in 1886, they would give work , to f rom 24yG0* to 80,000 men in London aiono;^,. about 500,000 thtonghm. tb& country,; - N „ • • .

, -„'"...■ TWO REMARKS. For the test of Mr Burns' article I must Prefer the leader to the Nineteenth Oenttvry. Altogether apart from his proposals they will find the article well worth reading. Two observations will naturally occur to every wader. The first is that at least one-half of the fund which Mr Burns propoaea should be secured for the payment of wages to the unemployed would be raiued by decking the already employed of the extra-earninga whioh they make by overtime. -This may be right or it may be wrong. But whether right or wrong, it is not likely to be very .popular with those who are going to lose their overtime money. Secondly, when everything is done that Mr Burns proposes, there will , still be the increase of population to be dealt with, and how ib is to be faced, excepting by such schemes as labour-settle-ments, farm colonies at Home and abroad, and the like, which he brands as "social will- o'- the- wisps," we do not know, and Mr Burns does not tell us. Possibly when Mr Burns has given the same attention to that subject that 'he haß to those whioh lie near to his hand, we Bhall have some more statesmanlike suggestions, for the solution of the problem.