Liberalism and the Social Problem Part 7

of the working time of the mines, and there is the margin of stoppages through slack trade and other circ.u.mstances, which at present aggregates 7 per cent. of the working time of the mines. Taking these last two alone, they aggregate 13 per cent., or considerably more, as a margin, than the reduction of working time which will be caused by the operation of this Bill, even when the full operation is reached.

First of all then, let the House consider carefully whether from these sources it is possible to overtake the 10 per cent. reduction which, in the first instance, the Bill imposes. It is a question nicely balanced; it offers matter for fair argument this way and that, but, taking all the means of mitigation together, not only singly but collectively, it is surely very difficult to believe that masters and men, organised as they are, and working together with good will, and with ample time to accommodate themselves to new arrangements, will not be able from all sources to overtake the comparatively small reduction in hours the Bill will effect.

I am inclined to an opinion that good use will be made of these margins, but even if we a.s.sume, for the sake of the argument, that there will be a net reduction in consequence of the pa.s.sage of this Bill in the output of coal, that reduction must be temporary and transient in its character. For fifty years there have been continuous changes in the conditions of coal-mining in this country. The hours have been reduced, the conditions of boy labour have been restricted, wages have been raised, compensation has been provided, and precautions against accidents have been multiplied. All these changes, the wisdom of which n.o.body disputes, may from a purely and crudely economic standpoint be said to militate against production. We have heard many prophecies, but what has been the history of the coal trade? There has been a steady, unbroken expansion of output during the last fifty years. In the period of ten years ending in 1874, 76,000,000 tons were produced; in the next ten years 112,000,000; in the next ten years 145,000,000; in the next ten years 172,000,000; and in the last period of ten years 214,000,000--a figure which has been greatly exceeded since.

If it be admitted that there may be a certain reduction in output as a consequence of this Bill, that reduction must be considered, not by itself, not in isolation, but in relation to the steady and persistent movement of coal production for the last fifty years. To me it seems certain that the small temporary restriction will be lost in the general tendency to expansion, as the eddy is carried forward by the stream and the recoiling wave is lost in the advancing tide.

But these arguments would be wholly vitiated if it could be shown that the restriction of hours was so violent in its character, so sudden in its application, so rigid in its methods as, not merely to cause a certain shrinkage in the volume of the output, but to upset the economy of the coal-mining industry. In that case there would be not merely a curtailment which might be mitigated, but we should have injured and possibly disorganised the industry; and it is at this point that it is proper for the House to consider the safeguards introduced by the Government into the Bill. These safeguards are of the greatest importance.

There is the safeguard of overtime. Sixty hours a year are permitted.

In districts where men work ten days a fortnight, twelve weeks may be one hour longer than the usual time allowed by the Bill; and where the days laboured are only four in the week, fifteen weeks of extended time will be possible through the provision of overtime. There are provisions with regard to the labour of certain persons permitted to remain below ground beyond the legal hours for special purposes, and there is a power which relaxes the Bill altogether in an emergency which is likely to delay or arrest the general work of the mine, and, of course, in any case where there is accident or danger. Finally, if there should be risk of a corner or an unexpected rise in price, the Government have power by Order in Council to suspend the whole operation of the law in order to prevent anything like a serious crisis arising in the coal trade.

I cannot bring myself to believe that with all these safeguards it will not be possible for the coal industry, if given time, to accommodate itself to the new conditions. It is only two years ago that I was invited from the benches opposite to contemplate the approaching ruin of the gold mines of the Rand through the change introduced in the methods of working. That change has been enforced, with the result that working expenses have been reduced, and the standard of production has increased. In making that transition, if time had not been allowed to tide over the period of change, then, indeed, you might have had that disaster which hon. gentlemen opposite have always been ready to apprehend. But there is here to be a gradual process of adaptation, for which not less than five years is permitted.

We are told that positive reasons, and not negative reasons, ought to be given in support of a measure which regulates the hours of adult labour--that you ought to show, not that it will do no harm, but that good will come from it. There are, of course, such reasons in support of this Bill, but they are so obvious that they have not been dwelt upon as much as they might have been. The reasons are social reasons.

We believe that the well-being of the mining population, numbering some 900,000 persons, will be sensibly advanced in respect of health, industrial efficiency, habits of temperance, education, culture, and the general standard of life. We have seen that in the past the shortening of hours has produced beneficial effects in these respects, and we notice that in those parts of the country where the hours of coal-mining are shortest, the University Extension lecturers find that the miners take an intelligent interest in their lectures--and it is among the miners of Fifeshire that a considerable development in gardening and also of saving to enable them to own their own houses, has followed on a longer period of leisure.

But the general march of industrial democracy is not towards inadequate hours of work, but towards sufficient hours of leisure.

That is the movement among the working people all over the country.

They are not content that their lives should remain mere alternations between bed and the factory. They demand time to look about them, time to see their homes by daylight, to see their children, time to think and read and cultivate their gardens--time, in short, to live. That is very strange, perhaps, but that is the request they have made and are making with increasing force and reason as years pa.s.s by.

No one is to be pitied for having to work hard, for nature has contrived a special reward for the man who works hard. It gives him an extra relish, which enables him to gather in a brief s.p.a.ce from simple pleasures a satisfaction in search of which the social idler wanders vainly through the twenty-four hours. But this reward, so precious in itself, is s.n.a.t.c.hed away from the man who has won it, if the hours of his labour are too long or the conditions of his labour too severe to leave any time for him to enjoy what he has won.

Professor Marshall, in his "Principles of Economics," says:

"The influence which the standard of hours of work exerts on economic activities is partially obscured by the fact that the earnings of a human being are commonly counted gross; no special reckoning being made for his wear-and-tear, of which he is himself rather careless.

Further, very little account is taken of the evil effects of the overwork of men on the well-being of the next generation.... When the hours and the general conditions of labour are such as to cause great wear-and-tear of body or mind or both, and to lead to a low standard of living; when there has been a want of that leisure, rest, and repose which are among the necessaries for efficiency, then the labour has been extravagant from the point of view of society at large....

And, since material wealth exists for the sake of man, and not man for the sake of material wealth, the replacement of inefficient and stunted human lives by more efficient and fuller lives would be a gain of a higher order than any temporary material loss that might have been occasioned on the way."

If it be said that these arguments are general, is it not true that special circ.u.mstances differentiate the case of coal-miners from that of many other industries in this country? Others have spoken of the heat of the mine, the danger of fire-damp, of the cramped position, of the muscular exertions of the miner, at work in moist galleries perhaps a mile under the ground. I select the single fact of deprivation of natural light. That alone is enough to justify Parliament in directing upon the industry of coal-mining a specially severe scrutiny and introducing regulations of a different character from those elsewhere.

The hon. Member for Windsor[10] who moved the rejection of this Bill described it as a reckless and foolhardy experiment. I see the miner emerging from the pit after eight hours' work with the a.s.sertion on his lips that he, at any rate, has paid his daily debt to his fellow men. Is the House of Commons now going to say to him, "You have no right to be here. You have only worked eight hours. Your appearance on the surface of the earth after eight hours' work is, to quote the hon.

Member, 'a reckless and foolhardy experiment'"? I do not wonder at the miners' demand. I cannot find it in my heart to feel the slightest surprise, or indignation, or mental disturbance at it. My capacity for wonder is entirely absorbed, not by the miners' demand, but by the gentleman in the silk hat and white waistcoat who has the composure and the complacency to deny that demand and dispute it with him.

The hon. Member for Dulwich[11]--himself a convinced protectionist, with a tariff with 1,200 articles in its schedules in his coat-tail pocket--has given us a delightful lecture on the importance of cheapness of production. Think of the poor consumer! Think of the importance to our industries of cheapness of production! We on this side are great admirers of cheapness of production. We have reminded the hon. gentleman of it often; but why should cheapness of production always be achieved at the expense of the human factor? The hon.

gentleman spoke with anxiety of the possibility of a rise in miners'

wages as a consequence of this Bill. Has he considered the relation of miners' wages to the selling prices of coal? At the pit's mouth the underground-workers' wages are only 60 per cent. of the selling price of coal. Free on board on the Tyne, the proportion is only 38 per cent. As coal is sold here in the south of England the proportion of wages is less than one-fifth of the whole price. Is it not clear that there are other factors at least which require consideration before you decide to deal with the human factor, which first attracts the attention of the hon. gentleman?

What about mining royalties? In all this talk about the importance of cheap coal to our industries and to the poor consumer we have had no mention of mining royalties. No. We never mention that. Yet, will the House believe it, it is estimated that mining royalties impose a toll of 6 per cent., calculated on the price of coal at the pit's mouth, or considerably more than half the total diminished production which could result from this humane Act of labour legislation.

But we are asked: "Why stop here? Why don't your arguments apply elsewhere?" and we are told of people whose conditions of life are worse than some of those of coal-miners. Why stop here? Who ever said we would stop here? I welcome and support this measure, not only for its own sake, but much more because it is, I believe, simply the precursor of the general movement which is in progress all over the world, and in other industries besides this, towards reconciling the conditions of labour with the well-ascertained laws of science and health. If we are told that because we support this measure we shall be inflicting an injury or injustice on other cla.s.ses of the population, I say there is a great solidarity among all cla.s.ses of manual labourers. I believe that when they consider this matter they will see that all legitimate interests are in harmony, that no one cla.s.s can obtain permanent advantage by undue strain on another, and that in the end their turn will come for shorter hours, and will come the sooner because they have aided others to obtain that which they desire themselves.

When the House is asked to contemplate gloomy pictures of what will follow on this Bill, let them recur to the example of Parliaments gone by. When the Ten Hours Bill was introduced in 1847, a Bill which affected the hours of adult males inferentially, the same lugubrious prophecies were indulged in from both sides of the House.

Distinguished economists came forward to prove that the whole profit of the textile industry was reaped after the eleventh hour. Famous statesmen on both sides spoke strongly against the measure. The Parliament, in 1847, was in the same sort of position as we are to-day in this respect, but how differently circ.u.mstanced in other respects.

That Parliament did not enjoy the wide and accurate statistical information in every branch of labour which enables us to-day to move forward with discretion and prudence. They were not able to look to the general evidences of commercial security and expansion on which modern politicians can rely. They could not show, as we can show, overwhelming examples of owlish prophets dazzlingly disproved; they could not point, as we can point, to scores of cases where not only increased efficiency, but a positive increase in output has followed the reduction of the hours of labour. The principle was new, the future was vague. But the Parliament of those days did not quail. They trusted to broad, generous instincts of common sense; they drew a good, bold line; and we to-day enjoy in a more gentle, more humane, more skilful, more sober, and more civilised population the blessings which have followed their acts. Now it is our turn. Let us vote for the Second Reading of this Bill, and in so doing establish a claim upon the respect of Parliaments to come, such as we ourselves owe to Parliaments of the past.[12]

FOOTNOTES:

[10] Mr. J.F. Mason.

[11] Mr. Bonar Law.

[12] This concluded the debate, and the Second Reading was carried by 390 to 120.

UNEMPLOYMENT

KINNAIRD HALL, DUNDEE, _October 10, 1908_

(From _The Times_, by permission.)

What is the political situation which unfolds itself to our reflections to-night? I present it to you without misgivings or reserve. For nearly three years a Liberal Administration, more democratic in its character, more widely selected in its _personnel_, more Radical in the general complexion of its policy, than any that has previously been known to British history, has occupied the place of power. During the whole of that period no single serious administrative mistake, either at home or abroad, has embarra.s.sed or discredited the conduct of public affairs. Three Parliamentary Sessions, fruitful beyond precedent in important legislation, have been surmounted with dignity and dispatch. The authority and influence of Great Britain among foreign Powers have been prudently guarded, and are now appreciably augmented, and that authority and influence have been consistently employed, and will be in the future employed, in soothing international rivalries and suspicion, in a.s.serting a proper respect for public law, in preserving a just and harmonious balance amongst great Powers, and in forwarding as opportunities have served, whether in the Near East or in the Congo, causes of a generous and disinterested humanitarianism.

The British Empire itself has enjoyed under Liberal rule a period of prosperous tranquillity, favourable both to development and consolidation; and it is no exaggeration to say that it was never more strong or more peacefully united than at the present moment. The confidence which the whole country, irrespective of party, feels in Sir Edward Grey in the present European crisis, is the measure of our success in foreign affairs. The gathering of the Convention of a United South Africa is in itself a vindication of colonial policy.

Each year for which we have been responsible has been marked by some great and beneficent event which has commanded the acquiescence--or at least silenced the dissent--of many of our professed opponents. In 1906 the charter of trade unions; in 1907, the conciliation and settlement of South Africa; in 1908, the establishment of old-age pensions. These are large matters; they will take their place in the history book; and on them alone, if necessary, I would confidently base the claims of his Majesty's Government to respect, if not to renown, in future times.

But although we do not meet to-night in any atmosphere of crisis, nor in any expectation of a general election, nevertheless I feel, and I dare say you feel too, that we have reached a climacteric in the life of this Parliament. The next six months will probably determine the whole remaining fortunes of the Government, and decide whether a gradual but progressive decline will slowly carry the Administration in the natural course to the grave where so many others are peacefully slumbering, or whether, deriving fresh vigour from its exertions, it will march forward conquering and to conquer.

I said a few minutes ago that this session had been marked by a measure of great and cardinal importance. Surely no one will deny the magnitude and significance of the step which has been taken in the establishment of a system of old-age pensions. It marks the a.s.sertion in our social system of an entirely new principle in regard to poverty, and that principle, once a.s.serted, cannot possibly be confined within its existing limits. Old-age pensions will carry us all a very long way. They have opened a door which will not soon or easily be closed. The members of both Houses of Parliament have been led to the verge of the cruel abyss of poverty, and have been in solemn session a.s.sembled to contemplate its depths and its gloom. All alike have come to gaze; none have remained unmoved. There are some distinguished and eminent men, men whose power and experience I cannot impugn, who have started back appalled by what they have seen, and whose only idea is to slam the door on the grim and painful prospect which has been revealed to their eyes.

But that is not the only spirit which has been awakened in our country; there are others, not less powerful, and a greater number, who will never allow that door to be closed; they have got their feet in it, they are resolved that it shall be kept open. Nay, more, they are prepared to descend into the abyss, and grapple with its evils--as sometimes you see after an explosion at a coal mine a rescue party advancing undaunted into the smoke and steam. Now there is the issue on which the future of this Parliament hangs--"Forward or back?"

Voices sound loud and conflicting in our ears; the issue, the sharpest and simplest, the most tremendous that can be put to a generation of men--"Forward or backward?"--is the issue which confronts us at the present time, and on it the future of the Government is staked. There are faint-hearted friends behind; there are loud-voiced foes in front.

The brewer's dray has been pulled across the road, and behind it are embattled a formidable confederation of vested interests. A mountainous obstacle of indifference and apathy bars our advance. What is your counsel? Forward or Back?

Let it be remembered that aged poverty is not the only evil with which, so far as our means allow, we have to grapple. What is the problem of the hour? It can be comprised in one word--Unemployment.

After two years of unexampled trade expansion, we have entered upon a period of decline. We are not alone in this. A reaction from overtrading is general all over the world. Both Germany and the United States are suffering from a similar commercial contraction, and in both countries, in spite of their high and elaborate protective tariffs, a trade set-back has been accompanied by severe industrial dislocation and unemployment. In the United States of America, particularly, I am informed that unemployment has recently been more general than in this country. Indeed the financial collapse in the United States last autumn has been the most clearly marked of all the causes to which the present trade depression may be a.s.signed.

It is not yet possible to say that the end of that period of depression is in sight; but there are some significant indications which I think justify the hope that it will be less severe and less prolonged than has been known in other trade cycles, or than some people were at first inclined to believe. But the problem of unemployment is not confined to periods of trade depression, and will not be solved by trade revival; and it is to that problem in its larger and more permanent aspects that I desire to draw your attention for a short time to-night.

There is no evidence that the population of Great Britain has increased beyond the means of subsistence. On the contrary, our wealth is increasing faster than our numbers. Production is active; industry grows, and grows with astonishing vigour and rapidity. Enterprise in this country requires no artificial stimulant; if it errs at all, it is from time to time upon the side of overtrading and overproduction.

There is no ground for believing that this country is not capable of supporting an increasing population in a condition of expanding prosperity.

It must, however, be remembered that the British people are more than any other people in the world a manufacturing people. It is certain that our population could never have attained its present vast numbers, nor our country have achieved its position in the world, without an altogether unusual reliance upon manufacture as opposed to simple agriculture. The ordinary changes and transitions inseparable from the active life and growth of modern industry, therefore, operate here with greater relative intensity than in other countries. An industrial disturbance is more serious in Great Britain than in other countries, for it affects a far larger proportion of the people, and in their distresses the urban democracy are not sustained by the same solid backing of country-folk and peasant cultivators that we see in other lands. It has, therefore, become a paramount necessity for us to make scientific provision against the fluctuations and set-backs which are inevitable in world commerce and in national industry.

We have lately seen how the backwash of an American monetary disturbance or a crisis in the Near East or in the Far East, or some other cause influencing world trade, and as independent of our control as are the phases of the moon, may easily have the effect of letting loose upon thousands of humble families and households all the horrors of a state of siege or a warlike blockade. Then there are strikes and trade disputes of all kinds which affect vast numbers of people altogether unconcerned in the quarrel. Now, I am not going to-night to proclaim the principle of the "right to work." There is not much use in proclaiming a right apart from its enforcement; and when it is enforced there is no need to proclaim it. But what I am here to a.s.sert, and to a.s.sert most emphatically, is the responsibility of Government towards honest and law-abiding citizens; and I am surprised that that responsibility should ever be challenged or denied.

When there is a famine in India, when owing to some unusual course of nature the sky refuses its rains and the earth its fruits, relief works are provided in the provinces affected, trains of provisions are poured in from all parts of that great Empire, aid and a.s.sistance are given to the population involved, not merely to enable them to survive the period of famine, but to resume their occupations at its close. An industrial disturbance in the manufacturing districts and the great cities of this country presents itself to the ordinary artisan in exactly the same way as the failure of crops in a large province in India presents itself to the Hindu cultivator. The means by which he lives are suddenly removed, and ruin in a form more or less swift and terrible stares him instantly in the face. That is a contingency which seems to fall within the most primary and fundamental obligations of any organisation of Government. I do not know whether in all countries or in all ages that responsibility could be maintained, but I do say that here and now in this wealthy country and in this scientific age it does in my opinion exist, is not discharged, ought to be discharged, and will have to be discharged.

The social machinery at the basis of our industrial life is deficient, ill-organised, and incomplete. While large numbers of persons enjoy great wealth, while the ma.s.s of the artisan cla.s.ses are abreast of and in advance of their fellows in other lands, there is a minority, considerable in numbers, whose condition is a disgrace to a scientific and professedly Christian civilisation, and const.i.tutes a grave and increasing peril to the State. Yes, in this famous land of ours, so often envied by foreigners, where the grace and ease of life have been carried to such perfection, where there is so little cla.s.s hatred and jealousy, where there is such a wide store of political experience and knowledge, where there are such enormous moral forces available, so much wisdom, so much virtue, so much power, we have not yet succeeded in providing that necessary apparatus of insurance and security, without which our industrial system is not merely incomplete, but actually inhumane.

I said that disturbances of our industrial system are often started from outside this country by causes utterly beyond our control. When there is an epidemic of cholera, or typhoid, or diphtheria, a healthy person runs less risk than one whose const.i.tution is prepared to receive the microbes of disease, and even if himself struck down, he stands a far greater chance of making a speedy recovery. The social and industrial conditions in Great Britain at this present time cannot be described as healthy. I discern in the present industrial system of our country three vicious conditions which make us peculiarly susceptible to any outside disturbance of international trade. First, the lack of any central organisation of industry, or any general and concerted control either of ordinary Government work, or of any extraordinary relief works. It would be possible for the Board of Trade to foretell with a certain amount of accuracy the degree of unemployment likely to be reached in any winter. It ought to be possible for some authority in some Government office--which I do not care--to view the whole situation in advance, and within certain limits to exert a powerful influence over the general distribution of Government contracts.

There is nothing economically unsound in increasing temporarily and artificially the demand for labour during a period of temporary and artificial contraction. There is a plain need of some averaging machinery to regulate and even-up the general course of the labour market, in the same way as the Bank of England, by its bank rate, regulates and corrects the flow of business enterprise. When the extent of the depression is foreseen, the extent of the relief should also be determined. There ought to be in permanent existence certain recognised industries of a useful, but uncompet.i.tive character, like, we will say, afforestation, managed by public departments, and capable of being expanded or contracted according to the needs of the labour market, just as easily as you can pull out the stops or work the pedals of an organ. In this way, you would not eliminate unemployment, you certainly would not prevent the creation of unemployables; but you would considerably limit the scale of unemployment, you would reduce the oscillation of the industrial system, you would increase its stability, and by every step that you took in that direction you would free thousands of your fellow-countrymen from undeserved agony and ruin, and a far greater number from the haunting dread of ruin. That is the first point--a gap, a hiatus in our social organisation--to which I direct your attention to-night, and upon which the intelligence of this country ought to be concentrated.

The second vicious condition is positive and not negative. I mean the gross, and, I sometimes fear, increasing evil of casual labour. We talk a great deal about the unemployed, but the evil of the _under-employed_ is the tap-root of unemployment. There is a tendency in many trades, almost in all trades, to have a fringe of casual labour on hand, available as a surplus whenever there is a boom, flung back into the pool whenever there is a slump. Employers and foremen in many trades are drawn consciously or unconsciously to distribute their work among a larger number of men than they regularly require, because this obviously increases their bargaining power with them, and supplies a convenient reserve for periods of brisk business activity.

And what I desire to impress upon you, and through you upon this country, is that the casual unskilled labourer who is habitually under-employed, who is lucky to get three, or at the outside four, days' work in the week, who may often be out of a job for three or four weeks at a time, who in bad times goes under altogether, and who in good times has no hope of security and no incentive to thrift, whose whole life and the lives of his wife and children are embarked in a sort of blind, desperate, fatalistic gamble with circ.u.mstances beyond his comprehension or control, that this poor man, this terrible and pathetic figure, is not as a cla.s.s the result of accident or chance, is not casual because he wishes to be casual, is not casual as the consequence of some temporary disturbance soon put right. No; the casual labourer is here because he is wanted here. He is here in answer to a perfectly well-defined demand. He is here as the result of economic causes which have been too long unregulated. He is not the natural product, he is an article manufactured, called into being, to suit the requirements, in the Prime Minister's telling phrase, of all industries at particular times and of particular industries at all times.