Published online by Cambridge University Press: 11 February 2009
On 27 February 1919, while Britain and most of Europe were gripped by serious industrial unrest, 600 trade unionists and 300 employers met leading cabinet ministers and civil servants at a National Industrial Conference in London. After a morning's debate, the trade unionists and employers separated, each to select thirty representatives to form a ‘provisional joint committee’ (P.J.C.) which might translate the morning's general good humour into hard practical proposals for mutual cooperation and reform. Within five weeks the committee had drawn up a report embracing twenty-six reforms, which was duly confirmed by the reconvened conference on 4 April and approved in principle by Lloyd George (with impeccable timing) on 1 May. The report was a major initiative in domestic policy. Although pledged at the 1918 election to build a ‘land fit for heroes’, the government – fully absorbed in the immediate problems of European settlement, demobilization and decontrol – had had little time to consider its practical implementation. With the report, both sides of industry had provided it with an agreed programme of reform which enabled it, in the industrial sphere at least, to commence the fulfilment of its election promises.
1 The Times, 5 03 1919.Google ScholarThe Times recorded at length the speeches of both conferences; the report of the P.J.C, is Cmd. 139 and Cmd. 501 in P.P. (1919), XXIV, 1 and 21; an official summary of early developments, including the full text of Lloyd George's letter of 1 May 1919, is in P.P. (1920), XIX, I, 35–43; the transcripts of all meetings of the P.J.C. are in the libraries of the department of employment and the T.U.C. Research for this article was completed with the aid of a grant from the Carnegie Trust for the Universities of Scotland, to whom I should like to express my gratitude.
2 Quoted in Shotwell, J. T. (ed.), The origins of the International Labour Organization (London, 1934), I, 209.Google Scholar
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7 Public Record Office, London. Cab. 63/29. Unpublished material in the P.R.O. appears by permission of the controller of the stationery office.
8 Charles, R., The development of industrial relations in Britain, 1911–1939 (London, 1973), p. 249.Google Scholar The italics are added.
9 Armitage, S., The Politics of decontrol of industry: Britain and the United States (London, 1969), p. 160.Google Scholar For hesitation after herculean labours see Johnson, P. B., Land fit for heroes (Chicago, 1968), p. 476.Google Scholar
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11 Apart from cabinet and ministry df labour records at the P.R.O., the most important collections are the papers of the National Confederation of Employers' Organizations (the C.B.I., Tothill Street, London); the minutes of the parliamentary committee of the T.U.C. (Congress House, London); the minutes of the national executive committee of the Labour party and the Henderson papers (Transport Mouse, London). Quotations from the papers of the N.C.E.O. are by permission of the C.B.I.
12 The prime minister who established the N.E.D.C, was Harold Macmillan, a co-author of Industry and state; that a national industrial council still has its advocates, see Wigham, E. L., ‘A new industrial forum in place of the House of Lords?’, The Times, 11 01 1977.Google Scholar
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20 Cab 23/11/WC 588(5).
21 The arguments are summarized from two weekly reports to the cabinet in 1919 by the intelligence division of the ministry of labour: Cab 24/92/CP 25 and CP 68, the latter appropriately dated 5 Nov.
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32 Compare his views in Cab 23/10/WC 584 (July 1919) with those in Cab 23/35 (Jan. 1920).
33 The Bodleian Library, Oxford: CF Rey papers, box 1/3.
34 P.R.O.: T 162/74/E 7112/01; House of Lords library, Lloyd George papers, F 36/1/42. For a full catalogue of his misdemeanours, see Lowe (thesis), pp. 199–200.
35 The admission was by the Treasury itself in Lab 2/1719/CEB 165/1923. For the initial organization – and disorganization – of the ministry, see Lowe, R., ‘The ministry of labour, 1916–24: a graveyard of social reform?’, Public Administration, LII (1973), 415–38.Google Scholar
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37 Charles, , The development of industrial relations, p. 210Google Scholar; for the importance of the Weekly report, see Lab 2/694/CS 115 and for its content, see above, p. 657.
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39 Lab 2/647/WA 4781/1920; Lab 2/775/IR 324/1922.
40 Lab 2/821/WA 5611/1920.
41 Lab 2/775/IR 1730/1921; Lab 2/841/TB 165/5/1921.
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44 Henderson argued at the second conference that ‘the pivot was the action, or failure to take action, on the part of the Government’ (The Times, 5 04 1919Google Scholar) and Smith, in a letter to Lloyd George in 1921, specified the government's breach of faith as the cause of the P.J.C.'s resignation (Lab 2/821/IR 615/2).
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48 Johnson, , Land fit for heroes, p. 471.Google Scholar
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50 The accusation by Charles (The development of industrial relations, p. 244Google Scholar) that the government's decision to continue negotiations with the P.J.C, was ‘out of order and that the reasons for it could hardly be good ones’ is incorrect. The P.J.C.'s continuance was requested by the trade union side and sanctioned by the second conference.
51 The Times, 5 04 1919.Google Scholar At the first conference, he reminded Thomas and Bevin in particular that there were workers outside the Triple Alliance (The Times, 28 02 1919).Google Scholar
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55 Blank, S., Government and industry in Britain (Farnborough, 1973), p. 23.Google Scholar Even Cole agreed that labour ‘did not always act wisely’ before issuing the challenge ‘who did in those years act so wisely that he can afford to cast the first stone?’ (A short history of the British working-class movement, III, 164).Google Scholar
56 Simultaneously being pressurized by the advocates of ‘direct action’, the T.U.C, parliamentary committee rejected overtures from bodies such as the Industrial League ‘owing to the views of a large number of Trade Unionists in regard to co-operation with employers in the task of solving industrial questions’ (Minutes, 11 06 1919Google Scholar). Later, the T.U.C, acknowledged that in 1919 it had been afforded unparalleled opportunities by the government to discuss specific items of legislation (P.R.O.: Prem 1/41) but their quibbles over every point of detail drove Home to declare: ‘I shall never put a tentative draft before anybody [again] … it has taught me a lesson I shall act on in future’ (Lab 2/556/WA 7809).
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59 Gleason, , What the workers want, p. 25.Google Scholar For the contradictions in union policy, see especially Halevy, The era of tyrannies, pp. 123ff.Google Scholar
60 The Times, 5 04 1919Google Scholar; diary, Beatrice Webb's, 27 03 1919.Google Scholar
61 Lab 2/775/IR 324/1922.
62 P.P. (1919), XXIV, 21, appendix I, xi. The italics are added.
63 BEC/NC/2/C4 (pt. 8)/NC 156. Smith's authority was demonstrated by his automatic selection as a delegate to the Washington labour conference – in contrast to Henderson.
64 Lab 2/771/CS 154/4/1919.
65 Lab 2/816/HQ 12190/2.
66 Citrine, Men and work (London, 1964), p. 247Google Scholar; Wigham, E. L., The power to manage. The history of the Engineering Employers' Federation (London, 1973), pp. 133ff.Google Scholar
67 BEC/NC/2/C4 (pt. 8)/NC 156; Wigham, , The power to manage, p. 119.Google Scholar For Baldwin's reaction, see James, , The memoirs of a conservative, p. 106.Google Scholar
68 See BEC/NC/I/C4 (pt. 1), especially NC 057, NC 0139.
69 BEC/NC/I/C4 (pt. a)/NC 086.
70 Hamilton, M., Arthur Henderson (London, 1938), pp. 214–15.Google Scholar
71 Charles notes the contradiction in The development of industrial relations, p. 246.Google Scholar
72 The ministry of labour was informed of the duplicity by a disgusted employer: Lab 2/841/TB 165/7/1921.
73 Lab 2/677/TB (Gen) 106/10; Lab 2/821/IR 615/2.
74 Lab 2/821/WA 5458/1920.
75 Johnson, , Land fit for heroes, p. 476.Google Scholar
76 See Lab 2/212/ML 626/4: ‘there is a strong tendency to look for future development along the line of Home Rule for Industry, rather than on the lines of greater central and state control… The policy of the future would therefore appear to be an increasing measure of decentralisation which will leave each industry a large share in the control of its own affairs, coupled with a general supervision by the State, and a larger amount of State activity in those industries which are backward in organization and development, until such time as they are sufficiently developed to be capable of exercising the measure of autonomy accorded to the highly organized trades.’
77 See, for example, The Times, 18 02 1919Google Scholar; Johnson, , Land fit for heroes, p. 376.Google Scholar
78 See above, p. 659.
79 For its weaknesses, see Halevy, , The era of tyrannies, pp. 91 ffGoogle Scholar; for its temporary success, see Charles, , The development of industrial relations, pp. 130ff.Google Scholar
80 The ministry of labour, despite the protests of its junior officials, refused to consider legislation on the extension of agreements, to provide secretarial assistance or to persuade local authorities to join (Lab 2/713/IR 184/1923; Lab 2/715/JIC 158 and 807/1921; Lab 2/851/IR 805/1925).
81 See above, p. 708.
82 In 1921, when pressed by the T.U.C, on trade boards legislation, Shackleton (somewhat ungrammatically) protested ‘the neutrality of the Department and the futility to put forward a proposal for legislation on the representations of one party and where there was no measure of agreement’. The government's inability either to settle or prevent industrial disputes was assured by a reduction between 1919 and 1924 in the number of industrial relations officials from above 230 to 29. Even Horace Wilson was forced to complain that numbers had been reduced ‘down to, if not well below, the minimum which is really necessary’ (Lab 2/1822/CEB 537/2/1921).
83 These and the following quotations are from memoranda prepared by the ministry of labour and introduced by Horace Wilson and Hubert Henderson for the prime minister in 1934 (MacDonald papers, P.R.O. 30/69/1/359 (12)). The memoranda include a summary of the ministry's reactions in 1928 to the Mond–Turner talks.
84 Howson, S. and Winch, D., The Economic Advisory Council, 1930–1939 (Cambridge, 1977), pp. 157–8.CrossRefGoogle Scholar