CAPITAL AND LABOUR.

Waikato Times, Volume 111, Issue 18524, 2 January 1932, Page 11

CAPITAL AND LABOUR.

HAMILTON EXPERIMENT. CO-PARTNERSHIP IN INDUSTRY. COMMENT IN LONDON TIMES. Mr Wickham Steed, former editor of The Times, has more than once drawn attention to the experiment in co-partnership in Hamilton, New Zealand, states the London correspondent of the Otago Daily Times. He thinks the present time is opportune to give publicity to this subject again, and he has written a long letter to The Times suggesting that the trade unions should lend their aid in working out a system of constructive employee co-partnership. Mr Steed quotes Mr Snowden’s speech of October 29: — “This is not the end of the Labour Party. It will rise agin, but only with new leaders who have vision and courage. But It must be based upon a citizen’s and not a class outlook. The defeat of the Labour Party will bo for its ultimate good if the lessons arc learned." It is unquestionable (says Mr Steed) that, to-day, the great majority of wage earners in this •country incline towards a citizen’s outlook. It is to be hoped that an equal proportion of employers are similarly inclined. If so, the two elements have an unprecedented opportunity to begin, under the auspices of tho National Government, the great and necessary work of co-operative social reconstruction. The capitalist system, a 3 we have known it, Is confronted with a serious challenge from the Communist system that is painfully groping its way in Russia, with a fervour that is well-nigh religious in its intensity, towards some nonindividualist, non-capitalist order of things.

It is the business of our people, as wardens of Western civilisation and of individual freedom, to evolve a saner and sounder alternative than “Manchester" economics can suggest to Communism or Marxian Socialism. Careful study of this matter for many years and reflection upon it have led me to the conclusion that only in and through co-partnership in industry can this alternative be found. Its root ■principle is that, after a limited rent, determined by its market price, lias been paid for the use of capital as an agency indispensable lo production, the producers by hand or brain, from the managing director to the apprentice, are entitled, as human beings, to an unlimited remuneration if, by co-oper-ative effort, they can earn it. This principle lias been applied with marked success, though on a small ■scale, in New Zealand, and with equal -success on a larger scale in some American and British industrial undertakings. It treats capital, not human labour, as a merchandise. Were it generally applied It might prove lo be the economic salvation of the country, for it would cheapen output without decreasing the remuneration of labour. If tho trade unions in quest of a more enlightened policy than that which has landed them In their present plight, would lend their aid in working out a system of constructive employee co-partnership, they might discargo a beneficent function. Otherwise, they may, indeed, wither. Facile and foolish ■schemes of nationalisation would have to go by the board; but in their place wc might get schemes —and the reality—of concerted national endeavour resulting in effective economic citizenship for (he millions of our politically enfranchised and economically dependent wage-earners. Schemes In Groat Britain. In a leading article The Times considers Hie question very fully:— “There arc two ways in which a transfer of partial control may be effected (says The Times). One is by Ihe acquisition of share capital on the same footing as an ordinary ■shareholder. The second is by the formation of a co-partnership committee of workers which is entrusted with a voice in Hie internal management. In the second case ■the workers do not gain a voice in Ihe business policy. In tho first I hey would have a voice equal lo their share-holding', or, perhaps, tentatively, some special representation on the board of directors. There is more profit-shar-ing than true co-partnership in industry; yet last year there were only 199 schemes of profit-sharing known lo the Ministry of Labour, and the number of employees entitled to participate was only 238,000. The number of co-partncr-■sliip schemes was 138, of which 71 ■provided for Ihe acquisition of shares on specially advantageous terms and 3-1 for setting aside a •share of the profits for tho employees but retaining the amount for investment in .the firm’s capital ci Mi or permanently or for a prescribed period. Tho co-partnership schemes of I lie gas companies arc usually of this kind. Other schemes provide for a part of the bonus to be capitalised and for the balance to be paid In cash or to go to the credit of a provident fund.

Trade Union Objections. "Without doubt a genuine scheme of co-partnership should give the worker an added interest hi the undertaking which employs him. There is acknowledged partnership as well as shareholding, and interest is stimulated by information on business affairs, or by added reward for successful enterprise, and by a sharejn the day-to-day management-. Nevertheless, for one reason or another, co-partnership is not actively desired hy workpeople. How far their difference is a matter of personal judgment, and how far roller Is trade union opinion can only lie guessed.

The trade union objections have arisen from -fears of injury to Ihe unions and of loss In the workpeople. It has been thought Hint men and women witti capital at slake, as well as wages, would not be so responsive lo the appeal for combination and. when necessary, for combined action; Hint resistanc.e to downward revisions of wage rales would lie weakened; that there, would lie a tendency for individual undertakings, and that consequently standard wage rates would he imperilled; that the* trade, union organisation would be undermined and Hie workers’ position rendered more precarious.