198 



The Review of Reviews. 



THE LABOUR WORLD. 



MR. GEORGE N. BARNES ON 

 STRIKES. 



Mr. George N. Barnes, M.P., late Secretary to the. 

 Amalgamated Society of Engineers, contributes a 

 characteristic paper to the Socialist Review on Trade 

 Unionism and Strikes. He says : — 



Trade Union combination no more exists solely for llie 

 purpose of engaging in slril<es tlian does national government 

 exist solely for the purpose of repressing thieves and murderers 

 and attacking outside foes. With respect to certain classes of 

 workers — those wliose pay and general conditions are extremely 

 low — I am inclined to say that strikes on their part are justi- 

 fiable almost under any circumstances. 



But, Mr. Barnes protests, " there are some Labour 

 leaders of anarchical proclivities who are leading 

 newly-organised labour into the ditch by strikes. 

 They have become obsessed in favour of the strike 

 policy, and in order to make it more attractive they 

 present it in a fancy name imported from France." 



THE TRANSPORT WORKERS' STRIKE. 



Mr. Barnes regrets that the resources of new 

 Unionists have been frittered away in futile strikes, 

 and adduces the transport workers' strike as a case in 

 point. He says : — " The strike was actually com- 

 menced against the employment of a single man who 

 refused to join the union. The result is, of course, to 

 put Labour in the Port of London back for years to the 

 old position of dependence and degradation from which 

 it had hcgtm to free itself." 



" FOOI.'S TALK." 



Mr. Barnes then proceeds to deal faithfully with the 

 Syndicalists. He quotes one of the miners' leaders, 

 who urged that the larger the area covered by strikes 

 the better, and even advocated their being waged 

 against the community : — 



He justified that pronouncement on tlie plea that the com- 

 munity h.id just made war upon Lal-our, and that therefore 

 Labour would make war upon the community. 



That, I say, is fool's talk. I for one will be no party to a 

 policy of that kind, because I know that nothing but disaster 

 can come of it. A general strike may be justifiable in certain 

 cases — in cases, that is to say, where the object was one the 

 attainment of which would outweigh the evils of civil war, and 

 in which Labour was so strongly organised as to have some 

 chance of success. 



To talk of the general strike as a general policy for organised 

 Labour is sheer madness. Labour could only wage war upon 

 tlic community by waging war upon itself. Labour is tlie 

 coniniunily. Other classes are mere excrescences or special 

 organs falling into atrophy, which it is the mission of Labour to 

 hasten by disuie into decay. 



THE REAL ENDS OF TRAIJE UNIONISM. 



The recent miners' strike. Mr. Barnes says, failed 

 because of its uneven equipment. It w;is really ended 

 by the ending of the resources of the South Wales 

 miners. That was the weakest link of the miners' 

 chain, and the strength of the whole was determined 

 by it. He urges that the Labour I'arty in Parliament 

 should be consulted, not after the onset of the battle. 

 but at the very beginning. Mr. Barnes believes that 



the strike will become more and more a weapon in 

 reserve, replacing the ancient, barbarous, and cruel 

 weapon of the strike by the modern and more effective 

 weapon of the vote. But Trade Unionism stands for 

 more than for striking or voting. It should be an 

 educative and constructive power, creating the spirit 

 and atmosphere which alone render these weapons of 

 value. Trade Unionism has conferred a great advantage 

 on the whole community by stimulating emplo>-ers to 

 improve conditions of employment and more efficient 

 methods of production. 



INDUSTRIAL LEGISLATION IN 

 AUSTRALIA. 



In the July Empire Review Australia's methods of 

 dealing with Labour troubles are most ably dealt with 

 by F. A. VV. Gisborne. The author thinks Wages 

 Boards and Arbitration Courts are not unmixed 

 blessings. He obser\es that, generally speaking, the 

 Wages Board stands for prevention and the Arliitration 

 Court for cure. The former, therefore, is more advan- 

 tageous to the patient ; the latter to the doctor. It 

 may be affirmed that among employers who are manu- 

 facturers the Wages Board is distinctly preferred to 

 anv other kind of industrial tribunal. As a rule, also, 

 the men they employ share that preference. But, 

 as before explained, there is a strong tendency on the 

 part of both employers and employes, where wages 

 and conditions of work are .subject to the arbitrament 

 of a Board, to settle their differences at the public 

 expense. Concessions granted to the men have to be 

 paid for by the public in the way of correspondingly 

 increased prices for the goods man'tfactured. 



Foreign competition is rendered ineffective to reduce 

 those prices bv the revision of the tariff in the interests 

 of the industries affected. If the men engaged in the 

 boot trade are granted higher wages, up goes the 

 price of boots at once ; and the duty on imported 

 boots is raised simultaneously. Not infrequently the 

 emplover gains substantially through an addition to 

 his wages bill. A typical case of this kind lately came 

 under the writer's notice. L'nder a Wages Board 

 award the bakers in a certain Australian city were 

 recently obliged to pay the men they employed con- 

 siderably higher wages than they had previously paid. 

 Directly afterwards, householders were called on to 

 pay an additional halfpenny for each loaf purchased. 

 The result in the case of one of the leading bakers was 

 that in return for an increa.sc of £3 a week in wages 

 he had to pay he made an additional w'eekly profit of 

 £20 on his bread. 



Mr. C;isborne .says that Wages Boards have unfor- 

 tunatclv rendered consumers generally the helpless 

 \ictims of a triple alliance of mtmufacturers, organised 

 working men and politicians. They have, in the 

 main, tended to the preservation of industrial peace, 

 l.uit at the high price of e\er-increasing cost of living. 



