British Trade Unions [antikvár]

FOREWORD By the Rt. Hon. Ernest Bevin, M.P. Minister of Labour and National Service In Great Britain, as in Germany and Italy before Fascism came into power, Trade Unions have stood for the independent and free organisation of the working people. It is significant that they should have been one of the first institutions to be destroyed by Hitler and by Mussolini. On the other hand, in China where policy is guided by a philosophy of freedom and tolerance, industrial workers are urged to join Trade Unions and Trade Union organisation is otherwise encouraged. In their origins British Trade Unions were a means of giving expression to the rights of men to an effective voice in deciding the conditions under which they give their labour. As this booklet shows, their progress over a hundred and fifty years has been an upward struggle. But whatever the conditions created by the broad stream of social and economic change, the guiding inspiration and objective throughout has been nothing less than the liberty of the ordinary man and the right relationship between fellow men. Many of the things for which the early Trade Unionists fought have long since been embodied in the vast body of social and industrial legislation in Great Britain. As obstacles are removed or overcome, the horizon becomes wider, and just as Trade Union organisation itself has developed from a local to a national and to an international basis, so the objectives have become more comprehensive or have taken on a deeper significance. Trade Unions must be concerned firstly with matters affecting wages, hours and conditions of employment, provision for industrial risks and generally the regulation of relations between worker and employer. But they could not truly fulfil their real function of representing the organised workers if they were concerned only with narrow sectional interests and ignored the wider interests and inspirations of those they serve. They must be ready at all times to meet new tasks with new vision and to preserve and create as well as making demands. This readiness to meet new problems has been most fully demonstrated by the actions of British Trade Unions during the war. The present war is essentially a struggle between the philosophy and outlook on which Trade Unionism is based and the negation of all that it stands for. In Great Britain, as in other democratic countries, whatever regulations may be made by the State, their enforcement must rest in the last resort 7