198 ENGLISH AGRICULTURAL LABOURER. 



By the aid of the Dockers' Union and the National Union 

 of Ships' Stewards peaceful picketing was carried out with 

 considerable success. Boats landing Irish labourers at 

 Liverpool, who were imported as strike-breakers, were met 

 by the pickets, and many Irish labourers either joined the 

 Union or were persuaded to proceed to Yorkshire for 

 work. 



On July 4, the Ormskirk Branch of the National Union 

 of Railwaymen gave forty-eight hours' notice of refusal to 

 handle produce from the affected area, but before the rail- 

 waymen's threat was carried out the strike was ended. At 

 the suggestion of the Superintendent of Police at Ormskirk 

 a solicitor, respected by both sides, was called in as mediator, 

 and he drafted a report which was accepted as a settlement. 



The men can claim to have won a victory, for in the his- 

 tory of agricultural labourers it was the first time they had 

 ever received by collective bargaining a reduction in the 

 hours. Overtime was granted at the rate of 6d. an hour and 

 there was a general rise in wages of 2s. a week. 



The strike lasted about a fortnight, and nearly 800 

 were subscribed from outside sources. Nothing, perhaps, 

 more fortunate could have happened to the Labourers' 

 Union than to have a strike in an industrial county like 

 Lancashire, for hot with the memory of the defenceless con- 

 dition of farm workers and the time-honoured arrogant tone 

 adopted by their employers, the industrial workers at the 

 Trade Union Congress of that year made a memorable grant 

 of 500 to the N.A.L.U. 1 for the purpose of helping them to 

 organise the whole country. 



To most people unacquainted with the long-dying, 

 hard customs of payment for labour in rural districts, it 

 came as a surprise to learn that whereas the farm workers of 

 Norfolk were beaten in their struggle to obtain a rise of is. 

 a week on a low wage of 133. the farmers of another county 

 who were already paying about i a week to all classes of 

 workers were able to pay another 2s. a week. 2 



The districts round Ormskirk, Garstang and Fylde yield, 



1 Fpr brevity's sake the National Agricultural Labourer's and Rural 

 Workers' Union is referred to in these pages as the N.A.L.U. 

 Cd. 5460, 



