Labour Supply And Regulation

"=='LABOUR SUPPLY AND REGULATION== During the World War the question of national " man-power " came to the front as never before. In a war engaging the whole resources of a nation its man-power must be distributed to meet four paramount obligations: (1) The maintenance at requisite strength of the fighting forces; (2) the supply to the forces of the necessary men for carrying on war; (3) the supply of the necessities of life for the civilian population, and (4) the maintenance of ordinary commercial work to the fullest possible extent in order to maintain financial credit. It is the business of Government to see that as far as possible the appropriate categories of men are drafted into each class. If there is a shortage of the gross supply it becomes a duty not merely to attempt to increase the total from new sources, but to regulate the existing supply in such a way as to increase its productivity.

The problem of " man-power " in war-time is obviously different from the outset in countries which begin a war with universal compulsory service and those which begin a war on the basis of voluntaryism. In the case of countries such as France and Germany, the approximate size of the fighting forces was known in advance, and this fact, combined with universal compulsory service, at any rate canalized the problem. In the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, where the fighting forces were expanded sevenfold, and where there was no compulsion at the outset and never universal compulsion, the problem was of a completely different order.

I. UNITED KINGDOM The history of labour supply and regulation in the United Kingdom during the World War is the history of how a system had to be improvised to meet the ever-shifting demands of the four predominant national needs. The problem for those concerned with the handling of labour throughout was to attempt, with an inadequate supply, to meet each of the four demands to the widest possible extent.

The first necessity in point of time was the recruitment of fighting forces on a scale hitherto unimagined. No attempt was made to limit the area of recruitment, nor would it have been possible in the early days to impose any such check. If limits had been imposed upon the patriotic enthusiasm which brought millions to the colours, serious obstacles would have been put in the way of building up the immense armies that were ultimately achieved; but the very impetus of recruitment of itself created in an acute degree the shortage of man-power, and accentuated it by reason of the fact that men were drawn largely from the very trades upon which the fighting forces depended for munitions.

To a certain extent the account of labour regulation and supply is an account of the long and difficult attempt to repair the ravages in the industrial ranks created by indiscriminate recruiting. The account of the handling of the problem may be approached from three points of view - the first negative, and the latter two positive: (A) - The negative, which consisted in the limitation of recruitment.

(B) - The stage of increase of labour supply, (t) by drawing on to vital work workers engaged on less vital work, (2) by bringing back from the forces skilled men to assist in the production of munitions, (3) by getting workers from new sources.

(C) - The intensive use of the available supplies of labour by its regulation, (I) by increasing mobility, (2) by preventing wastage, (3) by removal of trade-union restrictions, including ultimately dilution, (4) by obtaining full value for hours worked (under which is included the prevention of strikes and lockouts, the regulation of hours of employment, the provision of workshop discipline, and the provision of satisfactory working conditions), (5) by the handling of wages problems.

(A) THE Limitation Of Recruitment. - S0 far were the Government and the country from realizing the probability that excessive recruitment might lead to grave shortage of manpower, with the result that instead of widespread unemployment there would be practically no unemployment whatever of ablebodied persons, that the first steps in the handling of the labour problem by the Government and by the engineering trades respectively were as follows: - (a) The Government set up in the early days of Aug. 1914 a strong Cabinet committee for the prevention and relief of distress. (b) On Aug. 19 the executives of the Engineering Employers' Federation and the Amalgamated Society of Engineers met to discuss ways and means whereby the unemployment contingent on the national crisis might be minimized. (c) The attitude of the general business community was crystallized in the phrase " business as usual." This early point of view was rapidly modified. As early as the end of Sept. 1914 it began to appear that the rate of unemployment was far from high; and from Oct. onwards, to the shell conference of Dec. 21, the outstanding feature of the labour situation which began to emerge was the grave shortage of skilled engineering labour, threatening to make impossible the vitally needed expansion of production. Nor, when the figures of recruitment are examined, is this result surprising. By Oct. 1914 the group in the engineering trades had lost by enlistment 12.2% of their pre-war male workers. This percentage had risen by July 1915 to 19.5. 1 Against this loss must be offset the large proportion of new entrants into these trades, but these entrants never filled the gap thus created and would have been inadequate 1 Board of Trade report on the state of employment in the United Kingdom in July 1915, Part I, page 3.

if the demand on this group had remained at the pre-war standard, whereas in effect it was increased out of knowledge.

The situation accordingly was grave. The shortage of munitions was causing acute apprehension, and early in 1915 it had attracted general public attention. The first step, therefore, taken to deal with the matter was to provide some form of protection from recruiting for men engaged on munitions production. As early as Sept. 8 1914 Messrs. Vickers had suggested the possibility of the issue of a badge which should protect men from the recruiting officer on the one hand, and from irresponsible persecution on the ground of shirking on the other; but throughout 1914 nothing on a systematic or even considerable basis had been attempted in this direction.

In Jan. and Feb., however, the matter was seriously taken in hand by the War Office, and a special branch was set up Batlgittg: to deal with the " badging" of indispensable work men engaged on munitions. A scheme was brought into operation in March 1915, under which contractors were classified according to the importance and urgency of their work. Similar action was taken by the Admiralty, and in May of that year instructions were issued to recruiting officers that men in certain categories were not to be accepted for enlistment, but this action was in itself almost nugatory. The patriotic impulse to join up among the younger men was still too strong to admit of artificial restriction, but the lists were not really drawn up on any scientific basis. In fact, they were directed rather to protect the manufacturers of the finished product, i.e. shells, guns and ships, while making no real endeavour to cover the sources of supply, e.g. machine tools. The action taken by the Admiralty was probably more effective than that taken by the War Office.

The original war service badges issued by the War Office were accompanied by a certificate signed by Lord Kitchener.

" In token that his services are urgently required in the manufacture of ordnance war material for the defence of the realm, in which service he is required to exercise diligence and faithfulness." By the end of July 1915, 79,73 8 badges had been issued, over 60%, however, to a very limited number of firms.

At this stage (Aug. 1915) the Ministry of Munitions comes upon the scene. It was clear that one of the first duties of that department would be to organize labour supply. This meant, as a first step, the protection of workers engaged on the output of munitions from further recruitment. Speaking generally, when the Ministry of Munitions took over the work, one-fifth of the males employed in the industry specially concerned with recruiting had joined the forces. As a first step, to regulate the position and to take powers, a provision was introduced into the Munitions of War Act, in July 1915, enabling the Minister of Munitions to make rules authorizing the wearing of badges by persons engaged on munitions work or other work for war purposes.' Provisional rules under this section were made on July 23, and became statutory on Cct. 9.2 Before this date, however, namely on July 26, the Ministry of Munitions took over the administration of the badges from both the Admiralty and the War Office. Letters were immediately sent to the firms on the War Office and Admiralty lists of exemption, informing them that the basis of protection would be badges. At the same time letters were issued to firms on lists prepared by the supply departments of the Ministry of Munitions, in particular to firms such as machine-tool makers, iron and steel firms, principal electrical power stations, gas works extracting toluol, and chemical firms which had not been previously protected.

In order to keep this list up to date and to extend it where necessary, the Ministry of Munitions kept in constant touch with all the supply departments concerned and with employers of labour throughout the country; but from the first, and throughout, there was an almost inevitable conflict of interest between the points of view of the Ministry of Munitions as the department protecting labour for munitions work, and the fighting departments who were in urgent need of recruits.

1 Munitions of War Act, 1915. Section 8.

2 Statutory Rules and Orders, 1915. No. Io01.

The scheme was by no means a complete success. In the first place, there was the conflict of interest already mentioned. In the second place, it was difficult to obtain a scientific list of the firms to be covered, particularly when, as was the case, the types of munitions urgently required varied almost from week to week. In the third place, it was a matter of difficulty to decide to what class of men within protected industries or firms badges should be issued. Finally, at this stage the actual distribution of the badges was not in the hands of the department, but of necessity in the hands of the employer who alone knew the requirements.

Concurrently with the work of the issue of badges a new method upon which industry could be more scientifically protected was being provided by the National Registra tion Act of 1915. The registration undertaken on National Aug. 1 1915 had among its objects that of discovering Re,istra- o 5 g objects t what proportion of men of military age were still eligible for service and what proportion of those were employed on work vital to the output of munitions. When the results were supplied special arrangements were made for writing the account of men in industries vital to the continuance of the war upon starred forms, and when at the end of Oct. the figures were reported by the Registrar-General and the Scottish Office it appeared that 29.4% of the whole available labour was in " starred " industries. Of that more than 50% was on munitions production, the remainder being on railways, mining and agriculture.

It was becoming apparent while these two steps were being taken to protect industry that the existing method of obtaining recruits for the fighting forces was not merely producing an inadequate supply, but was, by its indiscriminate nature, severely handicapping the output of munitions. Accordingly, in Sept. 1915, the question of an immediate adoption of compulsory military service was seriously weighed, but on the balance of considerations it was decided to make a last appeal on a voluntary basis - the Derby scheme. The essential aspect of the Derby scheme, from the point of view of limitation of recruitment, was the establishment of the local tribunal for giving exemption, which formed the basis of the tribunals which functioned under the Military Service Acts when they came into force. The question arose whether all men should be submitted to these tribunals, or whether those protected by the Ministry of Munitions and the starred lists should be automatically exempted. After discussion the question was settled by the issue, on Nov. 16 1915, of the following notice on the enlistment of munitions workers, signed by Mr. Lloyd George and Lord Derby: No man officially badged or starred for munitions work may be enlisted for immediate service in the Army. Men so badged or starred may be " attested " for the Reserve on condition of returning to civil employment. They will receive the khaki armlet, and will not be called tip for service unless at some future time the Ministry of Munitions decides that they are more urgently needed in the Army than for munitions work.

Provision at the same time was made for the release from the colours of starred and badged men wrongly enlisted.

On Nov. 19 the Local Government Board issued the first instructions to the local tribunals, and in a public announcement the list of starred occupations subsequently reserved was set out as follows: List A. - Occupations required for the production or transport of munitions supplied by the Ministry of Munitions.

List B. - Coal-mining.

List C. - Agricultural, railway, and certain occupations in mining, etc.

List D. - Occupations (reserved occupations) of cardinal importance for the maintenance of some other branches of trade and industry.

Supplements to List D. were issued on Nov. 29 and Dec. 20 1915.

By this means, for the first time after the outbreak of war, something like a basis of a scientific protection for workers required for the output of munitions, and the main tenance of civilian necessities, was laid down. military Service The Derby scheme did not produce the necessary Act. number of recruits. The facts were, as Lord Derby's report, made public on Dec. 19 1915, stated, that 1,029,231 unmarried men had not offered themselves for service, of whom 651,160 were not starred. This figure of itself sounded the knell of voluntaryism, and on Jan. 51916 Mr. Asquith introduced the first Military Service bill. From the point of view of limitation of recruitment the important provisions of that Act are contained in Section 2, which empowered a Government department to grant certificates of exemption to men on work of national importance in consultation with the Army Council. It provided further that a Government department might direct that certificates of this nature previously granted should be regarded as certificates within the meaning of the Act.

In the course of the discussion on the bill grave fears were expressed by the Labour party lest the powers of the Act, and particularly those as to exemption, should be used for the purpose of industrial compulsion. It was pointed out by Mr.

W. C. Anderson on the second reading 1 that an employer would have power of life and death over his employee, and safeguards were accordingly introduced into the bill so that an employer should not, by merely dismissing a man, compel him to take military service. The Military Service Act became law on Jan. 27 1916. It was laid down that numbered badges issued by the Admiralty, War Office or Ministry of Munitions should be treated as certificates of exemption for the purpose of the Act.

Steps were further taken to exchange for numbered certificates the unnumbered Admiralty badges. The actual exchange was obviously a matter of considerable difficulty.

It is certain that for many reasons the exchange was never complete or satisfactory, but it is probable that no system could have been devised to render it so.

It was expected that the operation of the first Military Service Act would remedy the admittedly grave shortage in the inflow of recruits for the services. These hopes were not realized. Many causes operated to defeat them, but one to which increasing attention was drawn was the system of exemptions. The position was now reversed. At the outset of munitions shortage the forces were accused of starving the factories, now the factories were accused of starving the forces, the truth being that there were never enough men for both needs, and that each was supplied at the expense of the other according to the predominant military need of the moment.

However this may be, from the passing of the first Military Service Act the problem of limitation of recruitment became rather one of finding men for the forces than of preventing their enlistment, but with this vital qualification that they were to be found with the least possible loss to munitions production.

From this point begins the active policy of debadging, which was in effect the negative side of " dilution." Public feeling against men " under the umbrella " was growing, Debadg- and so well-informed a critic as Lord Derby could say on May 18, 2 in the debate in the House of Lords on the second Military Service bill, which extended compulsory service to married men who had not attested: " That is the question of men in munition works who are eligible for military service, and who are, in the opinion of the various localities in which they are working, only shirking by being in those works. That has given rise to more trouble with regard to recruiting than anything else. You have grocers, pawnbrokers' assistants, all classes of men going into munition works and securing exemptions; and it is the fact of their so securing exemption, although not skilled, that gives rise to so much irritation.. .

" Arrangements are being made by means of a committee to debadge these men and secure them for military service. But I should be deceiving your Lordships if I did not tell you that these methods of debadging are excessively slow; and if we are to wait for. that system to work itself out, coupled with two months' exemption, we shall not get the men as rapidly as is desired." His reference to the Debadging Committee indicates a step which had already been taken in the hope of controlling the issue of badges. This committee, with Mr. Walter Long, M.P., as chairman, held its first meeting on March 20. But although it was a Cabinet committee of an authoritative kind it was able to accomplish little. The difficulty was one which was common to this and to practically all other subsequent coordinating 1 Parliamentary Debates (1916) H. of C., Lxxvi I. 1416 et seq. 2 Parliamentary Debates (1916) H. of L., XXI. 1099.

committees set up to deal with the problem of the labour supply. The questions to be determined depended on two sets of considerations - (a) the general strategic policy of the Government, and (b) the practical facts of industry and production.

No committee could ever replace the actual departments concerned with the supply of munitions from the second point of view, nor the War Council or Cabinet from the first. This particular committee, possessing neither the power to decide policy nor the knowledge to settle badging questions in detail (which in the second week of May were coming in at the rate of 12,195 per week), was doomed to failure, and, after some months of struggling with an impossible task, made way for the ManPower Distribution Board on Sept. 3.

But while the committee was sitting the departments were not idle. The extent to which protection from enlistment had now proceeded may be judged from a consideration of the results of two returns obtained from badged firms to the number of 12,000, May and Dec. 1916. These returns showed that, of a total number of 2,112,896 males employed, a total of 1,118,767 were of military age. Of these 698,587 were skilled, leaving a very considerable balance of semi-skilled and unskilled whose retention was naturally challenged. A return covering a wider area indicated that the total number of men protected either by badges, exemptions or recruiting officers' certificates, was 2,686,400. A change in the basis of badging was introduced in May 1916. Up to that date the employer had been responsible for the issue of the badges. From that date the direct responsibility for their issue was assumed by the Ministry of Munitions. This shifting of responsibility, while casting a great additional burden on the department, put them in a position to deal with the whole question more comprehensively and with greater certainty. It enabled them, for example, to attack with increased vigour the problem of debadging. Debadging was necessarily carried on in close association with and by the same officers responsible for dilution. The principles upon which these officers worked were to deal with all cases of badged men who were not occupied three-quarters of their time on important work, or whose work could be done by female or other labour ineligible for military service, and for whom substitutes could be found. If the men were skilled they should be drafted to other civilian work of national importance; if unskilled, to the forces. The task set these officers was one of great difficulty, 3 but by Aug. 1916 32,798 badges had been withdrawn, 9,475 firms, covering 850,268 badges, having been visited.

But even so the position was far from satisfactory. The first battle of the Somme had made severe inroads on the man-power of the nation, and the situation in this respect was perhaps as critical at the date of the establishment of the Man-Power Board as at any time during the war.

This board were set up with at least a partial understanding of the difficulties which had been encountered by the committee on exemptions, the place of which they took.

Their functions included the settlement of questions arising between Government departments on the use of man-power, and the giving of directions to the departments. Moreover, programmes involving important demands for manpower were to be submitted to the board; the authority of which, subject to the War Committee, was final.

The board were only more successful than their predecessors in that, by their recommendations, they brought the rapidly growing difficulty to a crisis. They found themselves confronted by the two same root difficulties. They could not regulate the programmes either of the forces or the departments, as they did not control policy, and they were bound, on the practical question of the number and quality of men required to carry out the programmes, to rely on the executive departments.

But in spite of these difficulties the Man-Power Board were able to make new recommendations of first-class importance. One was that no badge certificates should be issued to men (a) who had already been decertified by a Government department; 3 For fuller account of " dilution," see below.

(b) whose cases were pending before tribunals; (c) to whom tribunals had refused exemption; (d) to whom tribunals had given temporary exemptions, and (e) already under notice to join the army. A second was that the Ministry of Munitions should be allowed to claim the services of men in the above classes, who would then, unless immediately required for service in an equally skilled capacity in the army, be transferred to reserve as the "army reserve munitions workers." Two results emerged from these recommendations when they were adopted, neither of which could have been expected by those who made them. The first was the growth of considerable resentment amongst the skilled trade unions, who complained that the new arrangement was contrary to the pledge given by the Prime Minister that skilled men should not be taken for general service. This feeling was so strong that in the end it led to a complete revision of the basis of exemption by what came to be known as the trade-card agreement. In the second place the Man-Power Board saw that they could not hope really to deal with their main problem of adjudicating between departments, unless they had effective local machinery. Though the machinery they planned was never put into force, they had indicated two things. First, the vital need of the whole question of manpower both from the recruiting and the civilian points of view being under one authority. Second, the necessity that that authority should be independent of all the departments interested. In this way they sowed the seeds of the Ministry of National Service, and it cannot therefore be said, even if at the time the upshot seemed disappointing, that in the long run it was unfruitful.

The new policy of exemptions caused grave difficulties with the trade unions. Their complaints were: - (a) that recruiting officers ignored the validity of badge certificates; ent. i ndeed that badged and certificated trade unionists had actually been arrested as defaulters; (b) that there were skilled men unbadged in railway shops; (c) that skilled men in commercial work were being taken, greatly to the detriment of the country's credit system; and (d) that skilled men with the colours were still being used for general service instead of skilled work. At the same time as these complaints were growing, grew the demand for men with the colours. To meet the demand, various proposals were mooted, but their shape was ultimately determined by the crisis precipitated by the wide-spread feeling of uneasiness among the men. There were three proposals before the Government. There was first the proposal of the Man-Power Board, which, subject to elaborate safeguards, suggested the immediate decertification and debadging of all men of military age under 26. There was the proposal of the Ministry of Munitions to leave all skilled men alone, but, with certain special exemptions for steel and similar work, to release all both semi-skilled and unskilled men as far as possible. There was finally the proposal of the skilled trade unions to the effect that no skilled men should be taken for the colours, that they should be protected from military service by a card issued to them by their societies and that skilled men with the colours should be used in mechanical units.

While these three proposals were being debated, the storm broke early in November. A strike at Sheffield centred round the recruiting of a man named Hargreaves, and in order to allay the general uneasiness, of which this strike was a symptom, on Nov. 18 the Trade-Card Agreement was signed at a meeting with the Executive of the A.S.E.: 1. That all members of 1 the Amalgamated Society of Engineers as one of the Trade Unions of the skilled engineering trades not now fully engaged, or at any time hereafter ceasing to be fully engaged, on war work, shall enrol as war munitions volunteers, and thus place their services at the disposal of the country, in accordance with arrangements under the war munitions volunteers scheme.

2. The skilled men referred to in this agreement are men who were either journeymen or apprentices prior to Aug. 15 1915.

3. All skilled men on war work or who have enrolled as war munitions volunteers shall be provided with a card of exemption from military service. The form of this card will be authorised by 1 The words " the Amalgamated Society of Engineers as one of the " were added at the conclusion of the conference with the Government on Nov. 18.

the Army Council and the card will be issued through the trade unions. Orders will be issued by the Army Council to all recruiting officers that no man who produces such a card to the local recruiting officer shall be removed from his work without a specific authority from the War Office, which will not be given without reference to the Minister of Munitions and the executive of the man's union. In case of any dispute arising as to a man's right to hold a card, it shall be decided by a representative of the War Office, a representative of the Ministry of Munitions, and a representative appointed by the executive of the union to which the man belongs.

4. The provision of skilled mechanics for the army will in future be made by the Ministry of Munitions. The trade unions will do their utmost to provide the Ministry of Munitions with skilled men, who will undertake to serve at the choice of the Ministry either in the artificers' corps in the army or as war munitions volunteers in civil life. If skilled men for the army are not secured in this way, it is clearly understood that recourse must again be had to the statutory powers.

5. That the Amalgamated Society of Engineers will furnish names and, wherever possible, particulars of skilled men, now serving in non-mechanical corps, and the Army Council will continue to make every effort to transfer mechanical units.

The scheme was subsequently extended to the remainder of the unions in the engineering and shipbuilding group.

This agreement did nothing directly to increase the supply of men for the army, except in the condition which required skilled men to enrol themselves as war munitions volunteers and thus render themselves mobile. It remained accordingly for the Government to decide how to draw from the ranks of the skilled and the semi-skilled the necessary recruits. This problem was still unsolved when in the middle of Dec. 1916 the first Lloyd George Government was formed.

The first step taken by the new Government in this matter was to form a Ministry of National Service. By doing this the Government recognised that the coordination of manpower could only be effected by an executive body, First and that no committee, however powerful and strongly M a i tio y tr of constituted, could hope to deal with a problem which was in the last resort inevitably one of detail. Thus one of the lessons of the Man-Power Board was learned, but the second and more vital was at this stage overlooked. The Ministry of National Service under its original constitution dealt only with civilian labour: it did not touch recruiting. This was a fatal flaw, for by the omission of this function not only did the department fail to balance the rival demands of the forces and home production, but it became a fifth wheel which, side by side with the organization of the Ministry of Munitions and the Admiralty, necessarily tended to revolve in the air, or if on the ground, then only to get in the way of the four effective wheels. As the result, till this defect was remedied by the reconstitution of this Ministry in Aug. 1917, the department was practically powerless.

But the needs of the forces and of production were incessant and remorseless. Consequently, until the reconstituted ministry was set up, the burden, as in the time of the Badge Committee and the Man-Power Board, continued to fall on the executive departments. These departments found that the Trade-Card Agreement had not alleviated their difficulties. Not only did the intake of recruits continue to be much below requirements, but the Agreement itself had led to new embarrassments of its own creation. On the one hand, so far as labour was concerned, it created almost as much unrest as it allayed. For its operation had been restricted to a selected list of unions, with the result that all those excluded resented their exclusion. On the other hand, from the Government point of view, a system which practically handed the exemption of skilled men to the trade unions was bound to work unsatisfactorily.

In the beginning of 1917 accordingly the Government decided that the needs of the forces rendered imperative the abolition of the Trade-Card scheme. Its place was taken by the schedule of protected occupations. Under this schedule men engaged in the specified occupations on Admiralty, War Office or munitions work or in railway workshops were entitled to a " scheduled occupations certificate if over a specified age or in a medical category below A." Men put in scheduled occupations received a " protection certificate " of a more limited and precarious character.

Protected Occupa- tions. It was obvious that this change would not be effected without the most strenuous opposition from the trade unions. It might have gone through, however, without actual industrial disturbance if it had not coincided in point of time with an amending Munitions Bill, which among other provisions rendered possible the compulsory introduction of dilution on private work. The combination of these new factors led in May 1 9 17 to the outbreak of perhaps the most serious strike which the Government had to face during the World War. In the result the Government adhered to their schedule, but it was announced that progress with that part of the bill which provided for dilution on private work would be deferred. It did not, in fact, reappear.

Reference must here be made to the work of the Reserved Occupations Committee, which, dealing with non-munitions trades, had functioned continuously since Sept. 1915, side by side with the Ministry of Munitions and the Admiralty, and was finally absorbed in the Ministry of National Service in Aug. 1917. As the recruiting campaign was intensified during the end of 1915, and particularly when the tribunal system came into operation with the Derby scheme, it became obvious that a real necessity existed for the creation of some central body which could give advice to tribunals in respect of trades not covered by the Ministry of Munitions and the Admiralty. This committee, originally appointed in Sept. 1915, and composed entirely of experts, framed successive lists of occupations in which, in their view, men should be protected from recruiting. The lists had regard to the necessity of maintaining national trade and food supply. At no stage did the issue of these lists entitle persons covered by them to automatic exemption as was the case with badged men. The only effect of the list was to set clearly before the tribunals, before which the men concerned would appear, the view that recruiting in the " certified " lists should not be encouraged. The " certified " lists originally included " badged " occupations, but these were gradually eliminated as time went on, it being made clear that in the case of these trades men must rely on their badges and not on the list. The general tendency of these lists was, after the first general scheme had been settled, to reduce the area of exemption. This reduction was carried out in three ways: (1) By removal of industries from the list; (2) by removal of occupations; (3) by fixing, and from time to time raising, the age limit below which protection should not be afforded. The age limit was taken in conjunction with the question whether a man was married or single in some of the earlier lists and in the final list with his medical category.

Even the institution of the schedule of protected occupations, and the progressive reduction of the area covered by the lists issued by the Reserved Occupations Committee, did not meet the needs of the situation. By the middle of 1917 it became evident that an effort on the widest possible scale must be put forward to rally the man-power of the nation for the campaign of 1918. The Government set themselves to attempt to remove the difficulties which had been indicated by the successive failures of the Man-Power Board and the first National Service Ministry by setting up a reconstituted Ministry, which (a) was responsible both for recruiting and for allocation of civilian labour, and (b) had an effective labour priority committee which weighed the claims of the various classes of production, under the general direction of (c) the War Priority Committee, a Cabinet committee presided over by Gen. Smuts, which had power to give general instructions as to the parts of the programme to which special attention should be directed.

The new Ministry of National Service came into effective operation at the end of Aug. 1917. It was presented with a very formidable task. The Russian collapse and the likelihood that the campaign of 1918 might be decisive, together with the heavy wastage in the forces during 1917, rendered it vital that there should be a large addition to the forces. On the other hand the manpower resources at home were subjected to the greatest strain, (a) to meet the ever-growing and varying munitions programme, (b) to meet the urgent claims of food production rendered daily more vital by the increasing menace of the submarine campaign, and (c) to maintain normal private industry at the highest point possible in the interest of the nation's credit.

There can be no question that the associating under one minister of recruiting and the supply of civilian man-power profoundly affected and improved the situation. The mere transfer of military recruiting to a civilian organization in itself tended to inspire confidence in the ranks of labour, a confidence which was increased by reason of the fact that the same civilian authority was generally responsible for the supply of labour for all other national purposes. But this confidence in itself did not supply the necessary recruits. It became necessary as 1917 progressed to make new and drastic proposals to meet the demands of the armies. But while these proposals were maturing, steps were taken to provide a new pool of substitutes for men released for military service. The men in the army at home unfit for general service were catalogued in a card index showing their civil trades and the employers for whom they worked before enlistment. These men were available not only for munitions work, but for work of national importance. The needs of the land were met by the provision of part-time labour, by German prisoner labour, by the enrolment under the Board of Agriculture of the Women's Land Army, and by the temporary release for harvest operations of units of the Home Army.

But all these measures of themselves could not solve the central problem of recruiting which was more and more becoming one of a scientific removal of exemptions at a far increased speed. It was becoming obvious all through the autumn of 1917 that it was necessary to get rid of exemptions held on occupational grounds, thus avoiding the long and tedious process of applying to the tribunals for the withdrawal of individual certificates of exemptions. This policy, currently known as the policy of the " clean cut," naturally was regarded with disfavour by labour. But after a long series of conferences it was finally embodied in the Military Service Act of Feb. 1918. This Act was supplemented by a second, passed in April 1918 immediately after the beginning of the German offensive of that year, raising the age limit to 51 and giving powers to cancel certificates of exemption on personal grounds.

Under these two Acts, two Withdrawal Orders - one in April and the other in June - were carried cancelling exemptions in a large number of trades and occupations, including most of those named in the list of certified occupations, though the withdrawals in that case were generally confined to men in medical Grade I. The result of these measures may be summed up in the statement that, from the inception of the reconstituted Ministry to the Armistice, 70,000 men were posted to the colours. At the same time so far as food production is concerned the position may be summarized in the following table 1: Finally the trade of the country had been maintained so that it emerged from the war second only to the United States in point of its financial credit.

(B) THE Increase Of Labour Supply. - In order to estimate the problem to be faced in reenforcing the ranks of labour depleted by recruitment, it is necessary to set out what was the estimated employed population at July 1914, what was the total enlistment for the forces until July 1918, and what numbers, apart from any extraneous action, would in the ordinary course of nature have flowed in to fill the gap thus created.

There is no absolute statistical basis for the period in question, but a trustworthy estimate can be framed by an examination of the Z8 returns obtained by the Board of Trade, checked by the 1 War Cabinet Report for 1918 (Cmd. 325).

census of population of 1911, and by considering the Board of Trade " Statistical Abstract of Information regarding the Armies at Home and Abroad" (No. 28 - 05 - I Feb. 1917).

The Z8 return (supplied by employers to the Board of Trade) indicates that the employed male population in the occupations covered by the Z8 return, was at July 1914, 10,61o,000. of The total occupied male population shown in the census of approximately 4,060,000.

bons. population was a roximatel The Board of Trade estimates that, allowing for the normal increase of population, and for emigration, this last number would have increased by July 1914 to 14,3J0,- coo, leaving a balance of 3,750,000 occupied persons not included in Z8 occupations. It is further estimated that of these, 2,150,000 were engaged as follows: - An examination of these categories will indicate that enlistment (except in the case of domestic service) would probably be inconsiderable, and it may fairly be estimated at not more than half that in the occupations covered by Z8. The total enlistment for the ro,6ro,000 covered by that return is 4,896,000. If half the proportion enlisted in these occupations is accepted in respect of the 2,150,000 males occupied in the miscellaneous occupations not covered by Z8, a total of about 450,000 is reached, giving a grand total of 5,346,000.

There remains the further 1,600,000 males necessary to complete the estimated total of 14,350,000 at July 1914. The majority of these would be employers and persons working on their own account, the one-man businesses from which in the nature of the case the proportion of enlistment would be comparatively small, and if 250,000 is added for this class this probably does not err in the low side. A grand total therefore of 5,596,000.

There are, however, still to be taken into account the unoccupied males, of whom there were approximately 200,000 in July 1914, and a considerable number of boys at school in 1914 who enlisted without entering an occupation. The proportion of enlistments here would in the nature of the case be high, and 250,000 would not be an excessive figure.

There is thus reached a total figure of approximately 5,850,000 for the whole of the United Kingdom. This will include reservists and territorials called to the colours at the beginning of the war both for the navy and army, but excludes men already serving with the regular forces.

This total can be checked by reference to the Board of Trade estimate for enlistment shown in the " Statistical Abstract of Information regarding the Armies at Home and Abroad." This shows the number of men enlisted in the armies up to the Armistice to be 4,970,000. To this must be added approximately 500,000 men called up to join the colours from the army reserve, special reserve, and pre-war territorials, giving a total not far short of 5,500,000. Similar figures are not available for the navy, but it is a very reasonable conjecture that the numbers would bring the total near the estimate of 5,850,000.

When this enormous total is envisaged, we see the task before those engaged on carrying on the output of munitions and the maintenance of vital services. Clearly if this 5,850,000 Provision had been a net loss the problem would have been for vital practically insoluble. It was not, however, a net loss, P Y, ,, as will be shown immediately, but over and above the operation of factors tending to alleviate the difficulty, the principal steps taken, apart from the intensive use of existing labour, were the following: - (a) The diversion of labour from less vital work, a diversion effected as to the greater part not so much by Government action as by the operation of first patriotic impulse and then economic stress.

(b) The return of men from the forces for causes other than physical disability.

(c) The introduction of new sources of labour, i.e. Belgian, Dominion, and finally enemy prisoner labour, on the one hand and the enormous influx of female labour.

If we take the causes entirely independent of Government action, which reduced the total, the two most important elements are (1) men returning from the forces to civil work, and (2) the natural increase of the population. Under the first head it is probable that the total reached was in the neighbourhood of 700,000. The figure, however, includes both men discharged for disability and men returned from munitions. The number in the latter class is dealt with below.

As to the causes of increase not directed by Government action, these may be set out in the following tabular form, which is necessarily based on a comparatively rough estimate for the occupations covered by the Z8 returns: Increase consequent upon natural growth of male population. .

Net immigration. .. ... .

Boys entering employment earlier than usual.. Older men who deferred retirement or who returned to work after retirement .

Males on strike or lock-out July 1914. Males out of work on an average on any one day July 1914 Men returned to civil work from the forces. .

To these must be added, in respect of the 4,000,000 not covered by Z8, approximately ioo,000, making a total of 2,100,000. This figure is in a large measure conjectural, but if it errs, it probably errs (though not considerably) on the small side. As a matter of fact the actual tables based on Z8 returns show a total of 2,366,- coo. The difference between the two figures may be due to: (1) Inclusion among enlistments of a certain number of men who joined the forces more than once.

(2) Inclusion among enlistments of a certain number of men who would normally have had to be replaced owing to death, disablement, etc., and for other causes, e.g. in consequence of their having become employers.

(3) Possible slight exaggeration by employers of numbers enlisted.

(4) Possible slight exaggeration of total male employment owing to omission of some firms which were shut down.

The true figure is probably therefore somewhere between the two, but for purposes of estimating the total net loss the higher figure of 2,366,000 is taken.

To get the figure for the net loss on the io,610,000 covered by the Z8 returns, there must therefore be subtracted from the 4,896,000 who had enlisted as at July 1918 2,366,000. An examination in the next place of the women employed in industry indicates that at July 1914 the number employed was 3,276,000, and that this had risen by July 1918 to 4,935,000, a net increase of 1,659,000 females. Of these additions to the ranks of industry analysis is precarious, but it is probable that not less than 75% were women who had left work or who entered upon it for the first time and that the remaining quarter were drawn largely from domestic service.

If the male and female replacements are added together the net numerical loss to industry is reduced to the comparatively small figure of 871,000. But this does not in the least represent the real loss to industry. In the first place, while the decrease in the number of males employed represented 23.8%, the increase in females was 50.6%. Without attempting to gauge the comparative values to industry of the sexes, these proportions of themselves indicate almost a quarter decrease of skilled or at any rate experienced persons, compensated for by an increase of unskilled or at best inexperienced persons. Moreover, so far as the male replacements are concerned, to a large extent these were not and could not be of the pre-war quality. To begin with, there was the large group of men discharged as physically unfit from the army. In the second place the newcomers were often, indeed for the most part, boys or men well past the prime of life or available for civilian service because of rejection for military 695,000 25,000 90,000 200,000 40,000 250,000 700,000 2,000,000 Loss to Industry. service. This last statement is indeed amply borne out by an examination of the ages of males employed in Oct. 1918, which shows that approximately 43% were boys under 18 or men over 511 - a very high proportion indeed. When to these considerations is added the fact that never in the history of industry had work to be carried at greater speed, at such continuous pressure, and in such circumstances of physical and mental strain, the deficiency to be filled is difficult to estimate in numbers.

To meet this deficiency the one effective method was the regulation of labour so as to spread the skilled men over the widest possible area, to automatize the work to the last degree, and to introduce unskilled' labour (by which in the last resort is meant woman labour) into every possible piece of work from which a skilled man could be withdrawn. The history of " dilution" is therefore in practice the history of how the deficiency was as far as practicable met. The other expedients, except the direct release of men from the colours, had a much smaller comparative effect. Such expedients as the use of part-time labour and the control of building licences to prevent the prosecution of private work had no doubt their effects. It is claimed, for example,' that 2,400,000 hours of part-time were worked in 1918, and that building licences in respect of work totalling 1,soo,000 were dealt with in the same period. But when it is remembered that the average working year during the war was not less than 3,000 hours, this gives us the time of Boo men, and incredibly composite men at that!

The diversion of men from less vital to vital work was a more serious contribution, and still more serious the release of men from the colours. So far as the first is concerned, however, this was achieved rather by patriotic impulse, and economic and military pressure, than by any direct Government action. Various attempts were made from time to time to close down forcibly the luxury trades, notably by the first National Service Ministry. But these efforts were neither successful nor necessary. Greater forces than orders of Government departments were at work remorselessly weeding out the unnecessary business, and either converting it for use in some effective national capacity or distributing its workpeople to national work. For not only did patriotic citizens resent being kept on private as opposed to war work, but the less patriotic, as compulsory service began to draw on, were quick to realize the protection from military service afforded by work of national importance.

On this point it is perhaps sufficient to give the actual figures of additional males absorbed by July 1918 into the principal occupations that may be described as directly involving war work. In three branches of trade only, and these three the most vital to the prosecution of the war, was there a net increase in the number of males employed at July 1918 as against July 1914, as may be seen from the statistics: - In all other occupations there was a net decrease, which bears something like a direct relation to the remoteness of the industry from immediate war work, reaching at its highest in the building trade a net decrease of 52.1%. Except in the case of actual Government establishments, this huge shifting over must be attributed to causes other than direct Government action, though the machinery which put the changes into operation - the priority lists and the employment exchanges - of course facilitated a natural process which, without these aids, would undoubtedly have taken far longer to complete itself, and might indeed have been, if not. directed, self-destructive. In this respect the employment exchanges rendered a service difficult to overestimate (see Unemployment).

The second device for increasing the available supply was the release of men from the colours. Of all the tasks set to the 'War Cabinet Report for 1918 (Cmd. 325).

civilian authorities in control of labour supply, this perhaps of its nature offered the most obstinate difficulties in administration. Nor is this surprising when it is remembered that the men had to be recovered from an army literally gasping for recruits. It has been stated above that 700,000 men in all were released from the colours for civilian work. The vast majority of these were released on medical grounds. The number of fit soldiers actually recorded in Nov. 1916 as having started work was 51,781. The percentages of these over the trades in which they were employed was shown in Sept. 1917 as follows: The actual number of men recovered is perhaps not a fair criterion of the value of the scheme, as many of them were or described themselves as pivotal men, but on the other hand a considerable proportion were found to have been released under a misconception as to their skill. On the whole, however, it was obviously necessary to attempt something of the kind, and when the difficulties are considered the civilian authorities are entitled to congratulate themselves on a not inconsiderable achievement.

This brings us to the really substantial contribution which was by way of bringing into bearing a completely new body of labour, and this resolves itself largely into " dilution." The schemes for bringing in Belgian and Dominion Dilution. labour, like the schemes for part-time labour, were more attractive in appearance than of actual service. So far as the Belgians were concerned, a certain number of skilled men came over in the first rush after the fall of Antwerp. To supplement the ranks of these, an organization, which worked with tireless energy, was set up in Holland to bring men over from that country. But though a good deal was accomplished the results with certain notable exceptions were disappointing. It was found in practice undesirable for various reasons that British and Belgian workmen should work side by side. It followed, therefore, that they could only be employed either in factories solely manned by men of their own nationality, or by firms so large that they could allocate to them a completely separate sphere of work. As a result they came to be employed only by such firms as Vickers, by one or two Belgian firms started in England for the manufacture of munitions, and finally and most successfully at the Birtley national factory. While, therefore, the high hopes originally entertained were not realized, a substantial, if limited, contribution was achieved.

The reenforcement by Dominion labour was less fruitful, and for obvious reasons. In the first place the number of skilled men (and the most acute shortage was always in this class) was not extremely high in the Dominions. But even if the number had been high it was never clear from the point of view of production whether it would not be better to use their services by placing contracts in Canada. Australia, etc. Indeed, it is probably true to say that as the war went on the general tendency was in this direction rather than in the direction of bringing the men over to the United Kingdom. And there were good grounds for this. In the first place, particularly as regards the Australians, there had to be taken into consideration not only the great distances to be covered, but the extreme difficulties with the immense calls on the mercantile marine of providing transport. In the next place, labour conditions as to wages, hours, etc., differed radically as between the Dominions and the mothercountry. To introduce into the same shop men working side by side on the same work at different rates of pay necessarily would be productive of difficulties, and experience showed that anticipations on this score were not ill-founded. In spite, however, of all these considerations a certain number of men were brought from Australia, Canada and South Africa, and on the whole the experiment was not unsuccessful. The numbers were small, but the men worked with zeal and loyalty.' Finally, before dilution is described, there must be-mentioned the employment of German prisoners. From the outset British labour refused to work side by side with these men, and indeed when their employment in the Medway shipways was mooted, a strike was only averted by dropping the proposal. They were in effect confined to agricultural work, and to certain isolated and uncongenial occupations such as quarrying. From the munitions point of view they may be left out of account.

The negotiations which preceded the introduction of dilution are dealt with below in the consideration of the Treasury Agreement of March 21 1915, and the subsequent events. What is described here is merely the mechanism by which a profound change was brought into industry without which it is certain that the munitions programme could never have been carried out.

Before, however, the actual introduction of women on to work previously performed by men is described, it is necessary to make it clear that this introduction on the mechanical side was only rendered possible by the immense simplification of the processes of production. It was the designers of jigs, the manufacturers of the automatic machines that rendered dilution possible, and the credit of making dilution possible must be laid at their door. And it is incidentally interesting to note, as will be noted more than once in the course of describing the regulation of labour, that war necessity introduced great and often beneficial changes in the whole structure of industry that have every appearance of permanence. In so far as the war preached the lesson of the automatic, a far-reaching change had been introduced, whether beneficial or not will be a matter for the future to decide.

There were two fundamental difficulties in the way of dilution. In the first place the employer resented the complete change of his system of working that dilution involved, and this attitude was only changed as the result of a long process of persuasion in which it is fair to say leading employers played an equal part with the officials whose special duty this persuasion was. In the second place there was the deep-seated objection of the trade unions to the invasion of the jealously preserved sphere of the skilled men by overwhelming numbers of possibly permanent competitors. When it is realized that both parties to the scheme - employers and employed - equally resented it the wonder is not that it took so long to launch but that it had in the end so convincing a triumph.

Up to Sept. 1915 practically no progress had been made. On Sept. 9 Mr. Lloyd George made an appeal to the Trades Union Congress at Bristol.' It met with some opposition, but undoubtedly had a profound effect on the labour movement as a whole, and the steady advance may fairly be marked from that date.

O n e immediate and practical result of that speech One P Supply was the establishment of a Central Munitions Labour Commit- Supply Committee (which was partly an extension of tee the National Advisory Committee, referred to below, which had negotiated the Treasury Agreement) with the following objects: " A joint committee representing the National Labour Advisory Committee and the Ministry of Munitions with additional members to advise and assist the Ministry in regard to the transference of skilled labour and the introduction of semi-skilled and unskilled labour for munition work, so as to secure the most productive use of all available labour supplies in the manufacture of munitions." The committee met for the first time and appointed two subcommittees to consider and report on (T) the fixing of wages in connexion with the introduction of semi-skilled and unskilled labour where only skilled workmen were previously employed and (2) the constitution and functions of local labour advisory boards. The proposals of the second committee, with regard 1 The total number of Dominion workmen came to about 7,000 of which by far the largest number (5,158) were Australians, whose passages, subsistence allowance and unemployment pay were met by the Australian Government. The number of aliens (Belgians, Dutch, Portuguese and Danes) was probably in the neighbourhood of 75,000, of which the large majority were Belgians.

Trades Union Congress Annual Report 1915, pp. 353-362.

to the duties of each board, were adopted by the Ministry on Oct. 14, as follows: (I) Its general function was to act as agent of the National Advisory Committee in the district, reporting to it and negotiating with the local representatives of the trade unions. But the board should in no case take up disputes with employers. That was either a matter for the Ministry of Munitions or for the trade union.

(2) It was the board's duty to see that employers carried out the provisions of Schedule II. of the Munitions of War Act, to report all cases of failure to the labour officer of the National Advisory Committee for action by the Ministry and to record or verify changes of workshop practice.

(3) The board should assist the Ministry in the enrolment and transfer of war munition volunteers. It would receive from the Ministry a statement of the number of men who could be set free from the various workshops, and should take steps to encourage the enrolment of men up to this number at least. The labour supply officer would also report to the board particular cases where sufficient enrolments could not be secured, in order that the board might remedy this if possible through the trade unions.

(4) The board should report to the labour officer or the National Advisory Committee all disputes and difficulties and cases in which men were engaged on private work or insufficiently employed, and should cooperate generally with the labour officers and the local representatives of the trade unions, to secure the most effective use of labour on the production of munitions of war.

Finally it was proposed that each member of the board should receive a fee of 2s. 6d. for attending a minuted meeting (not more often than once a day), travelling expenses (if he had a distance exceeding two m. to travel), and compensation for time necessarily lost from work at the rate of is. an hour. Trade union officials in receipt of fixed salaries were not entitled to claim this compensation.

These boards, though their mere existence probably contributed to the smoother working of the scheme, did not have considerable effect as executive agents. Nor is this surprising when it is remembered (a) that they consisted of members all of whom had full-time work in other directions, and (h) that dilution required for its effective institution the full-time work of specially trained men, whose sole object was the successful achievement of their task.

More important was the consideration by this committee of the all-important letter, known as CET, addressed to all controlled establishments by Mr. Lloyd George early in Oct. 1915. This letter enjoined in the most precise terms the necessity for the immediate introduction of dilution, and to give point to this injunction the firms were required to fill up a form showing the number of skilled men employed in operating (1) machines of any kind on shell and gun work, (2) capstan lathes and other automatic and semi-automatic machines or other work, or (3) engaged in other processes which might be performed by less skilled labour. The result of this letter was entirely disappointing, the replies indicating that, in all the firms circulated, only 2,124 skilled men were available for transfer. But if it proved nothing else, at any rate the letter proved that the scheme could only be put through by actual personal visits on a large scale.

The next matter to which the committee, with a great measure of success, devoted their attention was the procedure for effecting dilution. The recommendations made by the committee on this head were adopted by the Ministry of Munitions and circulated as circular L6 to controlled establishments. The essence of the circular was to insist on ample consultation of the workpeople and their representatives before introducing dilution - a recommendation which, if more faithfully observed in practice, would have prevented many disputes. It also gave a preliminary list of processes upon which women might suitably be employed. Further it emphasized the desirability of introducing a three-shift system where possible, and of avoiding the employment of women on night-work - again an interesting example of the emergence from war necessity of a practical contribution to permanent social reform.

While the committee, in these directions and particularly in respect of wages matters, was rendering service of first-rate importance by preparing labour opinion for the ac ceptance of dilution, steps were being taken to set Dilution up the executive administration machine without which me Qi t- it was clearly impossible to carry out a policy dependent for its success on its detailed application. After numerous experiments the final and successful solution of the problem was the establishment of a strong Dilution Department, manned largely by engineers, with a central and local organization. The work of the Department, which had a large travelling staff, had two objects - the first to convince employers of the possibility of dilution on a scale hitherto unimagined, and the second to see that conviction was followed by practical effect, which meant in innumerable cases prolonged and delicate negotiations with local trade unions. It is not proposed here to discuss the industrial disputes, such as those on the Clyde early in 1916, which were occasioned by opposition to the dilution policy. It is sufficient here to say that, when the intense feeling necessarily engendered in workpeople by a policy which appeared permanently to mortgage their future is appreciated, the comparatively slight nature of these disturbances was a great tribute both to the dilution officers and to the patriotism of the workmen.

If ever it were true that it was the first step that counted, it was true of dilution. It will perhaps therefore be sufficient here if a brief reference is made (a) to the admirable work performed by the Clyde dilution commission, which in effect broke the back of the opposition to dilution in the area where it was most actively resisted, and thus gave an admirable start to the campaign; (b) to the attempt at a later period to introduce dilution on private work, and (c) to the principal characteristics of dilution.

The Clyde dilution commission was appointed on Jan. 22 1916. The Minister of Munitions, on the advice of the trade-union leaders, had visited Glasgow and made a speech on Dec. 25 1915, at St. Andrew's Hall, to a meeting of shop-stewards. The shop-stewards, who represented what was subsequently known as the rank and file movement in labour circles, were embittered opponents of dilution. Though the meeting was stormy, and followed by a strike and the seizing of an advanced labour organ known as The Forward, yet it was not without its practical results. The opponents of dilution had been faced on their own ground, and though a noisy section had broken up the meeting, the mere appearance of a minister, prepared to face such opposition, had driven home to good and doubtful citizens alike the vital issue in controversy. Mr. Lloyd George had prepared the way for the Clyde dilution commission, and though the greatest storm was yet to break, it cannot be doubted that his action had rallied not only public but labour opinion to the side of the Government.

The commission started its work immediately at Messrs. Beardmore's, and proceeded at the same time to deal with Messrs. Lang, of Paisley, and Messrs. Weir. This action was almost immediately followed by a strike at Messrs. Lang's, which was settled after an interpretation had been given of a point in dispute in the circular governing dilution. A further trouble arose when at the beginning of Feb. another labour organ, The Worker, was suppressed, and various persons connected with it were arrested. A strike followed which ceased when the men, who were subsequently duly convicted and punished, were admitted to bail.

In spite of this beginning the commissioners persisted in their work, and on Feb. 22 a circular letter was addressed to all controlled establishments on the Clyde, with the result that by Feb. 29 the commissioners were able to report that schemes of dilution were in operation at ten establishments, which provided for the release of 74 o men and apprentices for more difficult and responsible work and the introduction of 1,333 persons, the bulk of whom were women.

This promising start was interrupted by the strike originating at Beardmore's on March 17, which lasted for a fortnight and led to the deportation under the Defence of the Realm Regulations of the ringleaders. The strike did not, as might have been expected, leave great bitterness behind it, and the commissioners were able to continue their work with such success that at the end of Aug. 1916, after having arranged for the employment of 14,000 women, they were able to hand over their work to the administrative machine which was now actively functioning.

The work of the Clyde dilution commission exhibits on a large scale the work carried out from day to day with always increasing success and facility by the dilution officers of the Ministry of Munitions. How many women they directly introduced cannot be said. It would of course be absurd to claim that the officers were responsible even to an appreciable extent for the influx into industry of 1,659,000 females referred to above. There were in the first place the Government establishments themselves with 223,000 more females than pre-war, and the vast majority of these were introduced without the direct intervention or indeed in many cases without any intervention by the Dilution Department. Then there were some 158,000 females in the Civil Service and some 600,000 females in occupations with which the Department were not concerned. But allowing for all this it is not open to question that in controlled establishments their work was of the highest importance. and that without it the introduction of women could never have approached the figure it ultimately attained. It should be added that the responsibility of dilution for Admiralty establishments was trans ferred from the Ministry to the Admiralty at the beginning of 1917 when the Admiralty Shipyard Labour Department was established. Thereafter the two departments worked side by side following common principles and closely similar methods. Later when the Ministry of National Service was reconstituted in Aug. 1917 the possibility of transferring the executive work of dilution from these departments to the Ministry of National Service was mooted. But it was ultimately decided that the work could not be better performed elsewhere, and the Ministry of National Service therefore confined itself to requiring an account of the progress of dilution and to developing substitution in areas not covered by the Admiralty and the Ministr y of Munitions.

The interest for the present purpose of the attempt to introduce dilution in private work is not in the success that attended the effort. For it had none, and from this source no contribution to the man-power of the nation was made. The importance of the effort is the indication which it gives of the change in the objects of dilution. When the scheme was first canvassed in 1915 it had for its only object the increased output of munitions. It was generally understood, and indeed pledges were given, that no skilled men should be released for the armies in consequence of dilution. But during 1916, and particularly after the first battle of the Somme, dilution came to be regarded at least as much as a means of securing men for the colours as of increasing munitions production. As 1916 drew to a close and the army's need for men was more acute than ever, it was decided to extend dilution, hitherto strictly confined to munitions work, to ordinary commercial work. The result of the attempt, combined with the abolition of the Trade-Card scheme, produced the great engineering strike of 1917, and the proposal was deferred, never to be taken up again. The trade unions were prepared to part with what they regarded as their industrial liberties in the national cause; they were sternly and finally opposed to part with them in what seemed to them the interests of private profit.

Before judgment is passed on the unions for their attitude, it is desirable to have in mind what in fact dilution really meant in practice and how deeply it cut into the cherished safeguards against unemployment and underpayment which years of trade unionism had patiently built up. Dilution involved four things all interconnected; subdivision of processes, the installation of specialized automatic machinery, the upgrading of existing labour, and the introduction of new labour. Each of these four aspects of the system was bound to modify not only temporarily, but in some degree permanently, the whole organization of industry. It was plain that when employers had once realized the success of mass-production, which was rendered possible by subdivision of processes, and the introduction of the automatic machine, they would be slow to abandon on private work what had proved so eminently successful on war work. It was true of course that with the disappearance of war orders for immense quantities of standardized articles the possibilities of massproduction would be seriously curtailed. But the employers had learned a lesson, and the unions realized that when the war was over it would not be forgotten.

Moreover, the subdivision of processes combined with upgrading tended to blur, if not to obliterate, the sharp line drawn between skilled men and all other workers. To appreciate the feelings of trade unions on this change it would help to consider what would have been the feelings of the medical profession if the Government had insisted that they should admit herbalists to their ranks.

Finally, the introduction of huge numbers of possible competitors was in itself a grave consideration, particularly in the engineering trades which were no strangers to a high rate of unemployment. Indeed the engineering trade was one of the six trades compulsorily insured under the Insurance Act 1911 against unemployment, as being specially affected by periods when work was not plentiful.

If, therefore, in spite of the natural reluctance of the trade unions and of the employers to accept dilution, and in spite of the great technical difficulties of its introduction in practice so great a measure of success was attained, the result is a high tribute not only to the dilution officers but to the employers and workpeople.

Finally, before leaving the measures adopted to reenforce the labour supply it is necessary to refer briefly to the training of munition workers. We need not explore the long histor y of negotiations with trade unions and education authorities which preceded the launching of the scheme of July 1915. It will, however, be some indication of the success which attended the scheme if it is stated that up to Aug. 31 1916 about 22,500 students received certificates of proficiency from the technical schools, of whom not less than 18,000 were placed. Moreover, at that date a great step forward was taken by the establishment of the first instructional factory. Messrs. Straker Squire's establishment at Twickenham was taken over and the foundations were laid for a scheme which not merely proved of immense service during the war but which was developed on an even greater scale after the war for the training of disabled ex-service men. By the end of the war about 50,000 persons had graduated through training establishments. Here once again war necessity had pointed the way to what may well develop into a permanent addition to the industrial resources of Great Britain.

(C) THE Intensive Use Of Labour.--It is a mistake to suppose that working-men, as a general rule, any more than any other class of the community, are prepared to adopt a roving life. There are certain occupations such as those of the navvy, and in less degree of the builder, in which regular movement is an essential incident. But generally, although the working classes probably tend to migrate more easily than other classes, they share the general preference for a fixed home and unchanging environment. But from the beginning of the war it was plain that mobility would have to be largely stimulated. It was, as Mr. Lloyd George said at Manchester in 1915, " an engineers' war," and it was plain that one or both of two courses must be adopted - either men must be brought to. the engineering centres or engineering must be spread over areas where it had not previously been carried out, or both expedients must be adopted. The approach to this problem indeed passed through at least three stages - the first in which the man was brought to the work, the second where the work was brought to the man and the third a combination of the other two.

(1) Increase of Mobility. - The first step of all was when, at the beginning of Aug. 1914 labour was suppled to Aldershot to get the Expeditionary Force off to France, and men were moved in large numbers from the northern shipbuilding yards to the naval dockyards. Valuable and indeed vital as this service was in itself, it did not really form part of the general plans for increasing mobility. Many, indeed a majority, of the men engaged on getting the Expeditionary Force off returned after a short period to their old work; and this, though in much less degree, was also true of some of the men moved to the dockyards.

The origins of a more general effort were found in the King's Squad, organized in July 1915 by the Newcastle armaments committee, and the war squad organized by the Glasgow committee. But it is necessary in the first place to give some explanation of the events that led up to the formation of these committees.

When about the beginning of 1915 public attention was riveted on the shell shortage, the general view held by the authorities was that the only way to increase production was to place further orders with the very limited number of Government establishments and private firms that had experience in the manufacture of munitions. All these establishments had declared emphatically that they could not possibly increase production unless (a) they could have a largely increased labour supply, and (b) trade union restrictions could be removed. The solution of the second demand was afforded by the Treasury agreement and the subsequent Munitions Acts. But the first demand in itself helped to create a position which converted the authorities to the belief that work must be spread to where the men were, rather than impose on the already breaking resources of the great armament firms a burden which was ex hypothesi beyond them.

As early as the end of 1914 the Board of Trade had challenged the policy of concentrating labour on the armament firms. They had suggested the possibility of group arrangements in districts with engineering experience where by a reasonable subdivision of work among the various firms the whole article required by the War Office could be provided. The War Office, however, did not accept this view, and in accordance with their wishes the Board of Trade made an intensive effort to discover new sources of labour and to divert to the armament firms large bodies of workpeople from other engineering works. The first part of the campaign has been already mentioned. The result of the second part was, as the Board of Trade anticipated, a failure. Employers were not prepared to release their men, when most of them felt confident that if contracts could be placed with them they could carry out the work far more expeditiously than if the same contracts were undertaken with men new to them by the already overburdened armament firms. As a matter of fact, at the end of Jan. the total number released by employers on commercial work for armament firms had reached a total of 942. The value of this figure will be realized when it is remembered that at this period one armament firm alone (Messrs. Armstrong's) were asking for 4,150 men.

It was plain that matters could not be left at that point. The Board of Trade proposed a survey of the engineering trade in order to discover what its capacity for armament production was. This plan was not adopted, but later a Home Office census of machinery following much the same lines was put in hand and produced excellent results. The Board of Trade were, however, authorized by the War Office to exhibit samples of shells, etc., at various engineering centres with a view to obtaining possible offers from local manufacturers.

In the meantime, following on a successful experiment on organizing a saddlery group in 1914 by the Board of Trade, the first cooperative group of manufacturers was formed in Jan. at Leicester. This group was formed under the auspices of the Board of Trade on Jan. 8, and the first order for 1,000 4.5 shells per week was placed with it by the War Office on March 30.

At this point the armament outputs committee of the War Office, under the chairmanship of Mr. G. M. Booth, and a little later the Treasury munitions committee, under the chairmanship of Mr. Lloyd George, come upon the scene. Mr. Booth and his committee from the outset took the view that both of the contending policies must be worked side by side - that is to say, that within the areas of the big armament firms men should be brought to the firms, while in other engineering areas the work should be brought to the men by distribution of contracts.

These principles were endorsed by the Treasury munitions committee, but they took the matter one step further by ordering the construction of national factories, a proposal first put to them in a memorandum presented by Sir P. Girouard.

Thus by April and May 1915 the principles, though destined to every form of subsequent modification of detail, had been established which moulded the whole supply of labour for munitions throughout the war. In short the vital decision had been reached that the whole engineering capacity of the nation should be used. In the first place the great firms with years of experience should be strengthened to the greatest extent possible, but this strengthening was not to be at the expense of encouraging the wide distribution of contracts to all firms or groups of firms capable of munitions manufacture; and in the second place national factories were to be set up under direct State management to supplement production from the other two sources. These general decisions depended for their successful carrying out in practice upon the supply of labour required being forthcoming. While it had been decided that movement of labour should be limited by spreading contracts, it was still obvious that before the work and the workman could be successfully brought together there would have to be considerable adjustments. The Board of Trade had through their employment exchanges already stimulated movement to a great extent, but the time had now come for a further step forward. As part of Mr. Booth's scheme for concentrating labour in armament firms in districts where these firms existed, two committees were established in Newcastle and Glasgow, known respectively as the N.E. Coast and the West of Scotland Armaments Committees.

Of these two committees, that of the N.E. Coast was the earlier and perhaps the more successful. It addressed itself immediately to the question of the transfer of labour from commercial to munitions work. With this end in view it took two steps: the first, which followed the precedent adopted by the Board of Trade, was to appeal to employers to release men; the second, destined to form the germ of the war munitions volunteer scheme, was to appeal to workmen to enlist voluntarily for munitions work. The first, even with local influence, was a failure, producing a negligible number of men for transfer, but the second was a striking success. By the middle of May under the first head 290 men had been transferred, by the end of June under the second i,080. At Glasgow a similar appeal for volunteers produced 434 transfers. But not only did these committees by the method of direct appeal lay the foundations of the war munitions volunteer scheme, but they went further and settled two vital points as to the basis of their employment. These points arose on the question of who was to be responsible for travelling and subsistence allowances of men transferred. It wa_ finally decided, with the approval of the Treasury munitions committee, that both these charges should be borne by the Government, and the financial basis of the war munitions volunteer scheme was thus established.

But matters had now reached a point where local effort, guided only by a small expert committee, could no longer control Munitions. Ministry of supersession of the committee by a strong central the situation. A strong movement was on foot for the department. The first step in this direction was taken when, on the advice of the Treasury munitions committee, Sir P. Girouard and Mr. Booth were appointed by Lord Kitchener to carry out the general scheme for the increase of the output of munitions proposed by Sir P. Girouard. This was on May 9, and Mr. Booth and Sir P. Girouard set themselves actively to work to create a department. But events were moving with, such swiftness that by May 26 the Prime Minister announced that a new department for the manufacture of munitions was to be established, and on that day Mr. Lloyd George took over this department at Whitehall Gardens.

The first steps taken by Mr. Lloyd George were to take over the organization of Sir P. Girouard and Mr. Booth to form the basis of the great supply departments of the Ministry of Munitions that were almost miraculousl y to alter the munitions position, and on the other hand to bring in Sir H. Llewellyn Smith, then permanent secretary of the Board of Trade, as general secretary of the Ministry with special charge of labour matters, thus laying the foundations of the two great departments of the Ministry that were ultimately to be known as the Labour Supply and Labour Regulation Departments.

It was upon the labour side of the new Department that the duty devolved of working out the schemes for transfer of labour initiated at Newcastle and Glasgow. Nor was much time lost in setting about this task. On June 8 1915 War Mr. Lloyd George met the National Advisory Committee and represented the gravity of the national situation, particularly from the point of view of munitions production. The National Advisory Committee devoted the next day to the consideration of a scheme which might help by increasing mobility to remedy the shortage of labour. They proposed in effect the extension to the country as a whole of the schemes adopted at Newcastle and Glasgow. Only skilled workmen in employment, but not engaged on Government work, should be enrolled. The volunteers should be transferred only to firms controlled by Government whose profits were restricted. They should on transfer be entitled to the same subsistence and travelling allowances as were authorized in respect of the earlier schemes. Mr. Lloyd George accepted the scheme in principle at conferences with the trade unions on June io and 16, and the war munition volunteer scheme was born. The conditions of the form of enrolment are worth giving in extenso. " In accordance with arrangements which have been made with the Minister of Munitions by the National Advisory Committee, acting on behalf of the Trade Unions, I undertake with the Minister of Munitions to accept employment on making munitions of war in such controlled establishments as may be named by him, and to remain in such employment during the war for so long as required (not exceeding six months in all) subject to the conditions set out.

" 1. The rate of wages paid will be that of the district to which the workman is transferred, provided that if in any case the workman proves that this is less than the rate he was receiving before enrolment, he shall be entitled to receive such higher rate.

" 2. The workman will receive over and above his wages the following allowances: " (a) If brought from a distance beyond that which he can reasonably travel daily, railway fare at the commencement and completion of the work for which transferred; and, where necessary, subsistence allowance at the rate of 2s. 6d. per day for seven days per week. It is clearly understood that the subsistence allowance is not intended to enable any workman to make a pecuniary profit.

" (b) If within daily travelling distance (exceeding half an hour each way) the value of workman's tickets and one hour's travelling time per day at the rate of time and a half.

" (c) If within daily travelling distance (not exceeding half an hour) the cost of workman's tickets.

" Subsistence and travelling allowances will be paid by the firm employing the workman, with the wages.

" 3. The workman may volunteer for a further period of employ ment after the completion of the period for which he is required in the first instance.

" 4. Any workman transferred from employment under this undertaking shall, if found suitable, be guaranteed employment during the war for a period not exceeding six months.

" I agree that any breach of this undertaking may be dealt with by a munitions court, consisting of a chairman appointed by the Minister of Munitions, with assessors equally representing employers and workmen, which may impose a fine not exceeding £3." It may be noted that throughout the discussions at this stage Mr. Lloyd George accepted the war munition volunteer scheme as the alternative to industrial compulsion.

The scheme was accepted in principle on June 20. On June 24 enrolment began under the auspices of the Labour Department of the Ministry of Munitions. A vast campaign of publicity was started, and munition work bureaux were initiated with almost startling rapidity at 200 town halls and 200 labour exchanges. The intensive period of enrolment was closed on July io, though enrolment continued after that date at the labour exchanges.

These were promising figures, but the result was that the first expectations were not to be realized.

In the first place it was obviously necessary that the employers, on whose work the volunteers were engaged, should have an opportunity of expressing their views on the transfer. Accordingly arrangements were made for a regular system by which employers should be given an opportunity of lodging a protest, and an expert panel of adjudicators on these protests was set up. When it is realized that protests in respect of no less than 60,000 volunteers were lodged, the sort of task set the adjudicators may be imagined. Nor was the volume of the protests the only difficulty. To decide on a protest involved an inspection of the firm to ascertain its direct or indirect contracts with the War Office (a constantly varying factor); to see the order books, and if necessary verify the work by inspection of the shops; to report on the nature of the work done by the volunteers; to find out what numbers of men of the same grade as the volunteers were employed by the firm, and if on short time or overtime; to discover what the effect of removal of volunteers would be on private work and on the continuance of the establishment.

Inquiries such as these made the progress of adjudication slow. Moreover, many men had volunteered who were not really skilled, and many more who were, without knowing it, engaged on munitions contracts, or who, knowing this, desired a change of firm. The result of the scheme at the end of Sept. was reported as follows: - out of 103,000 volunteers, 37,551 had been submitted to employers, of whom 28,551 had been rejected and 8,581 had been accepted. Of those accepted, only 4,529 had started work, including 721 placed by the Clyde and N.E. Coast Committees.

These results were at first sight extremely disappointing. The reasons for the comparative failure have already been indicated - i.e. employers' protests, the number of unskilled men volunteering, and the fact that many volunteers were engaged on munitions work. But there was another cause which had a very profound effect. The volunteer was entitled on transfer, in accordance with the Government undertaking, to the rate which he was receiving before transfer. Not only, especially in the case of piece-work earners, did this lead to grave administrative difficulties, but (what was more important) it excited the apprehensions of the employer, who viewed with dismay the prospect of the introduction into his works of men receiving different rates of pay from those enjoyed by his own workpeople. But all this does to show not show that the scheme, if disappointing, was a failure; ioo,000 men scattered all over the country had been enrolled. Very few, it is true, had been moved, but all, if the Government so decided, could be moved, for Sect. 6 (2) of the Munitions of War Act, 1915 made it an offence for an employer to attempt to dissuade a volunteer from moving. Unless, therefore, an employer in the early stages of the war radically reduced his private work, and in the later stages pressed dilution to its fullest extent, he was liable at any time to lose some of his best workers. In this indirect way the scheme had a far-reaching effect.

During the latter part of Sept. 1915 efforts were made to improve its working by a change in the method of administration. Under the scheme as originally launched the work had been done from London. An attempt was made in Nov. to carry out the work through the employment exchanges. The lists of men available for transfer (amounting to io,000) were forwarded to the appropriate exchanges, who were given elaborate and precise instructions as to procedure. But the new system had no better results than the old. In Nov. and Dec. 1915 only 753 were placed, although, in addition to the 10,000 men whose names had been sent from the Ministry, 6,515 more men had enrolled.

At this point the problem was complicated by reason of the fact that undertakings were running out and that reenrolment was becoming necessary. Invitations to reenrol were issued, and the response indicated that there was much dissatisfaction among the volunteers. None the less, enrolments proceeded speedily at the rate of about 2,250 a month. At the same time placings went on steadily, rising from 237 in Jan. 1916 to 337 in May, with the result that in June 1916 12,234 war munition volunteers had been placed in employment.

Again, one is face to face with the criticism that the scheme failed, and again it is necessary to point out that the failure was only partial. If numbers alone are examined it may be urged that the result was trilling, but numbers alone are by no means the final criterion. These men in effect constituted a mobile corps who could be thrown in at the point of greatest pressure at the most critical moments. They were a sort of Guards Brigade, who could be hurried to the weak spot when most needed. For example, in the autumn of 1916 more than a quarter of the skilled men employed at Dudley, Lancaster, Leeds, Renfrew and Templeborough were munitions workers. And again and again in the later years of the war, when every month, almost every week, involved sudden changes in the munitions programme, the availability of these men was of the highest possible service. It happened more than once, notably when the poison-gas factories formed almost a turning-point in the munitions programme, that the fitters, without whom the factories could not operate, were supplied from volunteers.

The work proceeded steadily, with the result that by Nov. 1918 212,000 war munitions volunteers had been enrolled and 81,180 transferred. This of course shows a notable improvement in 1917 and 1918. One of the reasons for the improvement, no doubt, was, for example, that enrolment was one of the conditions of the Trade-card Agreement.

As recruiting became increasingly intensive it was made clear that not only must a man, to obtain exemption, be shifted, but he must in addition be on indispensable work. By enrolling as a war munitions volunteer a skilled man automatically fulfilled the latter condition. Quite apart, therefore, from the patriotic impulse which moved men to seek work of national importance, enrolment, as affording a protection in itself, became increasingly attractive. It may, therefore, be fairly said that on the whole, over the period from its inception to the Armistice, the war munitions volunteer scheme both directly and indirectly was of vital national service.

Closely allied to, and indeed at the time indistinguishable from, the war munitions volunteer scheme was the scheme of the other mobile corps, incorporated in 1916 by the Ministry of Munitions, of the army reserve munitions workers, under which, by the end of the war, 58,200 men had been placed in employment. Under this scheme men were drafted into the army, but not detailed for service on placing themselves at the disposal of the authorities for use where they were required. The difference between them and the war munitions volunteers was more technical than actual, though in their case they were always liable to be called to the colours for general service.

Before leaving the war munitions volunteer scheme, brief reference should be made to the other pools of mobile labour which it was sought to form later in the war on the precedent of the war munitions volunteers. There were three schemes inaugurated under the first auspices of the old Ministry of National Service, the second and third under the reconstituted Ministry. The first was known as the National Service volunteer scheme. Under this scheme the surprising total of 400,000 volunteers were enrolled. As, however, invitations to enroll were issued to persons with little regard to their experience and ability, and to the work upon which they were engaged, it is not to be wondered at if the scheme produced no results. Indeed, by the time that this scheme was launched early in 1917, it is not an exaggeration to say that the field of labour available for vital national service had been searched not with a rake but with a fine-tooth comb. The only hope for any effective addition to the labour supply was by a carefully selected list of occupations adapted to persons of little experience in manual labour and of small or reduced physical powers. The second scheme of war work volunteers, initiated by the reconstituted Ministry of National Service, was on a smaller basis, and under this 32,700 persons were enrolled and placed on work of national importance, thus releasing younger men for the army.

There was finally the much more modest, though by no means ineffective, scheme of war agricultural volunteers, under which 3, 2 55 persons were placed in agriculture. In addition to this, 17,000 women were enrolled in the Women's Land Army, and 1,816 in the Scottish Women's Land Army.

(2) Preventing Wastage. - When the supply of labour was far below the demand, it was of the greatest importance that the fullest possible use should be made of it. There were two vital points in this respect - the first to get it where it was wanted, the second to keep it there. The war munitions volunteer and allied schemes were the means adopted to achieve the first purpose. The Defence of the Realm Acts and the Munitions of War Acts were used for the second purpose.

The question which presented itself to the Government early in 1915 was: - What check could be put on the freedom of the workman, on the one hand, to go to work not profitable in the national interest, and upon the freedom of the employer to attract him there? There were four courses open. The first was to close down commercial work so that the employer would be compelled to release his workmen for work of national importance. The second was to impose penalties on employers engaged on commercial work for attracting labour from munitions work. The third was to apply the penalty for moving to the workmen. The fourth, which was the simplest, and which was shown to he repugnant to the British character, was universal compulsion whether for war-work or fighting.

Whichever remedy was to be adopted, the fact that some remedy must be found grew plainer every day. Not only was it clear that a great volume of labour urgently needed for munitions work was still retained for commercial production, but what added to the difficulty was the bidding among contractors engaged on munitions work for one another's labour. Not only were rates of wages undergoing the most surprising variations, but every kind of device to add to workmen's earnings was adopted. Excessive overtime at double rates was freely advertised, immemorial practice as to travelling allowances was overturned, systems of piece rates designed to produce the highest rather than the lowest earnings were devised, and indeed in the shipyards there were allegations that a number of rivets were added to a workman's total to swell his. takings. Nor was the competition confined to private employers. The Government factories were bidding not only against private employers but against one another. The result was naturally, by making workmen restless, to reduce production all around.

All the four expedients mentioned above were canvassed by the Government. The fourth, - universal conscription, - by reason of its simplicity and its boldness, was the most attractive. Scheme after scheme to enforce it was considered only to be rejected when the result on labour opinion was weighed, but as late as June 3 1915, in a speech at Manchester, Mr. Lloyd George was suggesting the advantages of this way out. And the war munitions volunteer scheme, like the Derby scheme that followed it, was introduced as the final alternative to industrial conscription. But unlike the Derby scheme, when it failed to realize expectations it was not converted into a compulsory scheme. The country was, as events showed, prepared to be conscripted for fighting. It was not prepared to be conscripted for working, when the work was still in a large measure to yield private profit.

Industrial conscription as a means of preventing wastage was, therefore, never adopted. The three other methods were all attempted - the first with no result; the second two, as will be shown, with very considerable results. In March 1915, a bill was introduced and passed through both Houses of Parliament in two days, amending Section i (3) of the Defence of the Realm Consolidation Act 1914, which empowered the Admiralty or the Army Council " (a) to require that there shall be placed at their disposal the whole or any part of the output of any factory or workshop in which arms, ammunition, or warlike stores or equipment, or any articles required for the production thereof, are manufactured; " (b) to take possession of and use for the purpose of his Majesty's naval or military service any such factory or workshop or any plant thereof." This was amended to enable the Admiralty or Army Council to take over private factories and shipyards and to require them to be worked as directed, and " to regulate or restrict the carrying of work in any factory or workshop." The object of these words was not plain on the face of them, but their intention was to enable the Admiralty or Army Council, by giving directions which would in effect close down a factory or workshop, to cause the labour to be diverted to war work. This intention was made plain when this provision -vas reenacted by Section io of the Munitions of War Act 1915, with the addition of words directly referring to the engagement or employment of any workman or classes of workmen.

Like many other war enactments this power proved useful, but not for the purpose for which it was intended. The wholesale closing of factories in order to release labour was seen almost at once to bear too much similarity to the Chinaman's method of roasting pig. It would not only gravely dislocate trade, but it would necessarily throw out of work, not only the skilled men who would be readily reabsorbed, but a large army of unskilled men for whom work was not at the time available. Moreover, the new theory of sending work to the workman rather than the workman to the work was beginning to gain ground. And the provision, though reenacted, from this point of view fell into desuetude. But from the point of view of a weapon often flourished, and on very rare occasions used, it remained a potent weapon till the end of the war for coercing refractory employers.

The second method was attempted in the following month. On April 29 a regulation was made under the Defence of the Realm Regulations (amended later to extend its scope) imposing a penalty on manufacturers of munitions for (a) attracting men away from munitions work, and (b) for engaging any workman resident more than io m. from the factory in question except through a labour exchange. And as supplementary to this, the Board of Trade made a regulation under the Labour Exchange Act requiring employment-exchange officials to give priority to vacancies on war work. These regulations, except possibly in a deterrent sense, were hardly more effective than had been the effort on the first plan. So far as the first offence was concerned, evasion was fatally difficult to detect; indeed there was throughout the war no instance even of a prosecution on this head. Moreover, there was one perfectly simple method of evading the spirit of the regulation without infringing the letter. All that was necessary was for a firm to raise wages above the level of its competitors, and leave the news to percolate, as it invariably did.

So far as the second part of the regulation is concerned, there can be little doubt that it did contribute substantially to the centralization of labour supply, but here again the means of evasion were easily discovered. Where men from a distance were required, if it could be arranged that they should shift their residence of their own accord to within to m. of the factory, they could be, and constantly were, taken in at the gates.

The solution was found under the third scheme. It had long been clear that the effective method was to restrict the workman's liberty of movement rather than the Leaving employer's right to engage, while at the same time Certifi- taking action to limit the employer's freedom to fix cates. any rates of wages which he might choose. The delay in resorting to this method was due to the great reluctance which was felt in introducing any measure which could readily be represented as, if not industrial conscription, at least as, in a way, a system of indentured labour. Both steps were taken by the first Munitions of War Act, 1915. Section 4 (2) of that Act required the employer to seek the sanction of the Minister before varying rates of wages. Section 7 required a workman on munitions work to stay with his employer unless in possession of a " leaving certificate." The actual form of the prohibition was to impose a penalty on an employer who, within six weeks from a man's leaving his previous employment on munitions work, took him on without a leaving certificate. In order to provide against a misuse of the power given to the employer by this section an appeal was allowed to a workman to a special domestic court constituted by the Munitions of War Act, known as the munitions tribunal.

The measure of the efficacy of this step is illustrated in part by the fact that, with the sections controlling profits and forbidding strikes and lockouts, it was regarded by employers and workmen alike as the central provision of the new Act, and partly by the extraordinary results which followed its total repeal by the Munitions of War Act, 1917. From the day that Section 7 came into force an employer could be sure of his quota of labour, and the workman, realizing that his freedom of movement was no longer unlimited, settled down with more regularity to his work. But along with its obvious advantages this new instrument of labour regulation possessed certain obvious defects. The employer was given remarkable powers. While the workman could not leave without a certificate, the employer could dismiss without one. When with the heavy preoccupations that the war cast on employers, dismissals and engagements were often left in the hands of foremen, it will be seen how provocative of difficulty the section might be. On the one hand, from the national point of view, a workman might be out of work for six weeks when his services were urgently needed. From the workman's point of view the difficulty was more acute, since an unjustifiable dismissal without a certificate might lead to his recruitment. These were the main sources of grievance, and the complaints were bitter. The commission, consisting of Lord Balfour of Burleigh, and Mr. (afterwards Sir) Lynden Macassey, who investigated the unrest on the Clyde at the end of 1915, reported that the operation of Section 7 was in many cases harsh, and was generally one of the principal causes of labour uneasiness. They did not recommend a repeal of the provision, but were strongly in favour of amendments to make its operation less harsh. The Ministry of Munitions had concurrently arrived at the same conclusions as those submitted by this commission, and in the amending Act of 1916 effect was given to them. The three most important amendments in that Act were those requiring an employer to give a certificate in all cases of dismissal, except those of misconduct, giving the workpeople the right to demand a certificate if suspended for more than two days, and to require a week's notice or wages in lieu.

Even these amendments did not remove the growing tide of resentment against what was freely described in labour circles as the " slavery " section. The truth was that this was a measure which definitely affected the individual in his daily work, and its operation was always present to his mind. The measure was endurable in the earlier years of the war, but with the growing strain it began to have serious effects on the moral of the workpeople. After the May strike of 1917, commissions of inquiry, under the general chairmanship of Mr. G. N. Barnes, M.P., were set up into the causes of labour unrest. All the commissions (which reported territorially) agreed in finding that Section 7 was a potent source of trouble.

Repeal was, accordingly, decided upon, and the section disappeared with the Munitions of War Act, 1917. The result, Economic though not what was expected, was profound. Em- Check ployers had prognosticated a wholesale shifting of labour from factory to factory. This expectation was not fulfilled, but it only failed of fulfilment by reason of the action of the employers themselves in raising wages often to extravagant heights to retain workpeople. The plain fact was that with a huge shortage of labour there was no longer any economic check on wages. The provisions of Section 4 (2) of the Munitions of War Act, 1915, had in this regard been futile, and the real check had been Section 7. Its disappearance restored his bargaining power to the workman with formidable results in the variation of wages.

No subsequent action could hope to arrest the forces let loose by the abolition of the section. But as the difficulties of the position became increasingly apparent, an effort was made to meet the difficulty in 1918 by the introduction of a system of licensing of firms, known popularly as the " embargo " scheme. Under this scheme it was proposed to take advantage of the Defence of the Realm regulation already referred to, which enabled the Government to direct the methods of employment or engagement in a factory. Firms were instructed that after the receipt of the effective letter no further labour of the types scheduled was to be engaged without the licence of the Ministry of Munitions. In fact, though more than 32,000 firms were known to be engaged on munitions, by Sept. 1918 letters had been issued to only loo firms. But the proposal was bitterly resented as an attempt to reintroduce Section 7 under a new form. It led on July 23 to a strike at Coventry which seriously threatened the production of munitions. A committee under Mr. Justice McCardie, which was set up to inquire into the circumstances of the strike, reported that the Government's scheme was justified by circumstances, though possibly the method of its introduction might have been more tactful. But the strike struck at the whole basis of the scheme, with the. result that it had little effect. The only substantial contribution to the problem of the prevention of wastage had been Section 7. Nothing before or after it took its place.

(3) Removal of Trade-Union Restrictions

The history of the actual introduction of " dilution " - which, of course, represented by far the most important removal of trade-union restrictions - has already been given. It is only necessary here to give an account of the negotiations which led up to the Treasury agreement of March 21 1915 (later scheduled to the Munitions of War Act, 1915) with some indications of its value.

Already by the end of 1914, both in shipyards and engineering shops, an acute shortage of labour had manifested itself. One of the methods of remedying this shortage generally recommended by employers was the removal of trade-union practices and restrictions. These practices were of four main types: (a) The practice providing that only a skilled man with certain credentials might do certain classes of work; (b) the practice which distinguished sharply the allocation of skilled work as between various classes of skilled men; (c) the practice which defined the hours and output permissible in given classes of work; (d) the practice requiring the employment only of trade unionists in certain shops or in certain classes of work.

There were, and are, of course many variations and gradations of four main types, but these are probably predominant. There was a long and painful history behind these restrictions. They represented to the workman the entrenchments patiently established through long years of struggle against under-payment and unemployment. They were, in fact, labour's Magna Carta. War necessity demanded from labour its temporary repeal.

The first attempts to secure this end were made by the employers - both by ship-builders and engineers. The ship-builders had their first meeting as early as Nov. 3 1914 at York. The employers there proposed for the first time the suspension of trade-union practices and customs. The meeting had no result. Local meetings at Glasgow and Newcastle were equally fruitless, and another general meeting on Dec. 9 carried the matter no further. Later in Dec. the Admiralty intervened but without success, and the matter was reported to the Board of Trade at the end of the year almost at the same time as the equally fruitless result of the series of engineering conferences.

The three main difficulties felt by the trade unions were: (a) The danger even in war-time of sacrificing the results of years of struggle without the most stringent guarantees that the sacrifice should be purely temporary; (b) the necessity of confining the sacrifice wholly to war-work; (c) the importance, even so far as war-work was concerned, of securing that private employers should not reap financial advantage from the sacrifice.

The subsequent negotiations, under the aegis first of the Board of Trade, and later of the Chancellor of the Exchequer and the President of the Board of Trade, were directed to meet these three points. As a first step letters were addressed to the A.S.E. by the War Office and the Admiralty, pointing out in general terms the need for increased labour supply. This was followed on Jan. 13 by a general conference between the Engineering Employers' Federation and the A.S.E. and kindred unions at Sheffield. This conference, like all its predecessors, was a failure.

After this breakdown Sir George (afterwards Lord) Askwith was appointed by the Board of Trade to attempt to reach a settlement. At his suggestion his single-handed efforts were su p plemented by the a p pointment by the Prime Minister on Feb. 12 of the Committee on Production, consisting of Sir G. Askwith (chairman), Sir George Gibb, representing the War Office, and Sir Francis Hopwood (afterwards Lord Southborough), representing the Admiralty. The committee directed their attention in the first instance to the shipbuilding trade, and succeeded in making an agreement on the subject of broken time, which unhappily broke down on May 23.

On the greater issue, though it was ultimately necessary to bring in the Cabinet, the committee were at any rate successful in effectively preparing the ground for a settlement. In their interim report of Feb. 20 they made three principal recommendations: (a) Increased production by removal of restrictions on the manufacture of shells and fuzes with extension of the employment of female labour; (b) the prevention of stoppages of work by reference of differences to an impartial tribunal to be set up by the Government; (c) guarantees to be given by contracting firms and held by Government in respect of removal of restrictions.

Simultaneously, on March 5, the Engineering Employers' Federation, with the A.S.E. and kindred unions, had ultimately reached a limited agreement in a memorandum known as the Shells and Fuzes Agreement. This made the following provisions: (i.) It assigned certain processes definitely to skilled men, but allowed interchange of skilled men; (ii.) it permitted the introduction of semi-skilled or female labour in suitable cases, subject to no reduction of wages; (iii.) it insisted on restitution of pre-war practices.

A ballot taken on this among the members of the constituent unions in April was favourable, but even before the result was known the agreement had marked a long step forward on the road to the Treasury agreement. In the meantime the committee on production were negotiating further with the unions, and in their third interim report recommended immediate removal of demarcation restrictions in Government establishments, and removal in private establishments subject to safeguards akin to those provided in the Shells and Fuzes Agreement.

But in spite of the Shells and Fuzes Agreement, and the efforts of the committee on production, nothing really effective had been accomplished. Men and employers alike were waiting upon the Government. In March 1915 the Government acted. Up to this point two of the principal difficulties of the trade unions in respect to removal of restrictions had been faced - i.e. the limitation of removal to war-work, and guarantees for restitution - but the aspect of the financial position of the private employer remained to be considered. And its consideration was vital, because the workmen were little disposed to give either their lives or their privileges in the cause of increased private profits. The committee on production were fully alive to the need not only for a dramatic gesture in this matter, but for dramatic results following upon the gesture. They recommended accordingly in their fourth report (March 5) that the Government should assume direct control of shipbuilding and armament firms, and should use this direct control radically to restrict profits. These proposals were explored, and throughout March the Board of Trade were conferring with the principal Restriction. of Profits. 7 a rmament firms with the object, not so much of con trolling their methods of manufacture, as of controlling their profits. These negotiations did not do more than place the Government in the position of announcing to the A.S.E. in the course of the negotiations for the second Treasury agreement (and embodying the announcement in the agreement) that profits would be limited. But the announcement was, in fact, the decisive factor in securing adhesion to the agreement.

In the middle of March the Government, as represented by the Chancellor of the Exchequer, the President of the Board of Trade, Mr. Montagu and Dr. Macnamara, together with Mr. Balfour as representing the Opposition, met representatives of the trade unions in full conference. The trade unions were represented by a committee under the chairmanship of Mr. Arthur Henderson, which was constituted as the result of the conference as the National Labour Advisory Committee. The negotiations started on March 17 and were concluded on March 19, and resulted in a document of such vital importance to the whole future of labour regulation that it is given in full: - The workmen's representatives at the conference will recommend to their members the following proposals with a view to accelerating the output of munitions and equipments of war.

(1) During the war period there shall in no case be any stoppage of work upon munitions and equipments of war or other work required for a satisfactory completion of the war.

All differences on wages or conditions of employment arising out of the war shall be dealt with without stoppage in accordance with paragraph (2).

Questions not arising out of the war should not be made the cause of stoppage during the war period.

(2) Subject to any existing agreements or methods now prevailing for the settlement of disputes, differences of a purely individual or local character shall, unless mutually arranged, be the subject of a deputation to the firm representing the workmen concerned, and differences of a general character affecting wages and conditions of employment arising out of the war shall be the subject of conferences between the parties.

In all cases of failure to reach a settlement of disputes by the parties directly concerned, or their representatives, or under the existing agreements, the matter in dispute shall be dealt with under any one of the three following alternatives as may be mutually agreed, or in default of agreement, settled by the Board of Trade: (a) The committee on production.

(b) A single arbitrator agreed upon by the parties or appointed by the Board of Trade.

(c) A court of arbitration upon which labour is represented equally with the employers.

(3) An advisory committee representative of the organized workers engaged in production for Government requirements shall be appointed by the Government for the purpose of facilitating the carrying out of these recommendations and for consultation by the Government or by the workmen concerned.

(4) Provided that the conditions set out in paragraph (5) are accepted by the Government as applicable to all contracts for the execution of war munitions and equipments, the workmen's representatives at the conference are of opinion that during the war period the relaxation of the present trade practices is imperative, and that each union be recommended to take into favourable consideration such changes in working conditions or trade customs as may be necessary with a view to accelerating the output of war munitions or equipments.

(5) The recommendations contained in paragraph (4) are conditional on Government requiring all contractors and sub-contractors engaged on munitions and equipments of war or other work required for the satisfactory completion of the war to give an undertaking to the following effect: Any departure during the war from the practice ruling in our workshops, shipyards, and other industries prior to the war, shall only be for the period of the war.

No change in practice made during the war shall be allowed to prejudice the position of the workpeople in our employment, or of their trade unions, in regard to the resumption and maintenance after the war of any rules or customs existing prior to the war.

In any readjustment of staff which may have to be effected after the war priority of employment will be given to workmen in the employment at the beginning of the war who are serving with our colours or who are now in our employment.' Where the custom of a shop is changed during the war by the introduction of semi-skilled men to perform work hitherto performed by a class of workmen of higher skill, the rates paid shall be the usual rates of the district for that class of work.' The relaxation of existing demarcation restrictions or admission of semi-skilled or female labour shall not affect adversely the rates customarily paid for the job. In cases where men who ordinarily do the work are adversely affected thereby, the necessary readjustments shall be made so that they can maintain their earnings.

A record of the nature of the departure from the conditions prevailing before the date of this undertaking shall be kept and shall be open for inspection by the authorized representative of the Government.

Due notice shall be given to the workmen concerned wherever practicable of any changes of working conditions which it is desired to introduce as the result of this arrangement, and opportunity of local consultation with the men or their representatives shall be given if desired.

All differences with our workmen engaged on Government work arising out of changes so introduced or with regard to wages or conditions of employment arising out of the war shall be settled without stoppage of work in accordance with the procedure laid down in paragraph (2).

It is clearly understood that except as expressly provided in the fourth paragraph of clause (5) nothing in this undertaking is to prejudice the position of employers or employees after the war.

(Signed) D. Lloyd George.

Walter Runciman.

Arthur Henderson.

(Chairman of Workmen's Representatives.) Wm. Mosses.

(Secretary of Workmen's Representatives.) March 19th, 1915.

The Amalgamated Society of Engineers were not parties to this agreement, and on March 25 a further agreement was concluded with that Society which contained two additional points of first-rate importance - an undertaking by the Government to limit the profits of contractors on war work, and the limitation of the agreements to war work purely.

This was a great achievement, and equal credit is due to the members of the Government who secured it and the unions who accepted it. But the plain truth is that its acceptance by the rank and file in actual practice was not a matter of weeks but of weary months, as the account of the progress of dilution indicates. Indeed it is fair to say that the agreement had not a real chance to produce results until not merely the first Munitions Act had made the safeguards statutory and the removal of restrictions compulsory, and had limited profits, but the second Munitions Act of 1916 had provided effective powers to regulate the wages of women entrants. From that date, as has been shown elsewhere, progress began, but the Treasury agreement may well take its place among historical records of the World War as a crystallization of the deep and unswerving purpose of the ordinary British citizen to serve the nation even at the cost of his livelihood.

It should be added that throughout the war considerable uneasiness was manifested by the trade unions lest the safeguards provided by the Munitions Acts would not be adequate to secure effective restitution. Conscious of the great changes produced by the widespread introduction of the automatic machine, they feared that the changes might tend to become permanent. One step taken during the war to reassure them was the appointment of a number of officers by the Labour Department of the Ministry of Munitions to keep effective records of all departures from previous practice. The work of these officers was extremely effective, and there is no doubt that the records provided by them covered a great deal of the ground.

The existence of the records made restitution practicable. The trade unions did not rest content till what was practicable was made inevitable. Two committees were appointed in turn to consider what added safeguards were necessary - the first under the chairmanship of Sir John Simon, K.C., M.P., in 1916; the second under 1 These three clauses are taken from the form of undertaking proposed in the Second Report of the Committee on Production.

2 A point not provided for in this paragraph was the question whether the semi-skilled worker should also receive the guarantee (given according to the practice of some shops to the skilled worker) of his minimum time rate when he was employed on piece-work. The reason of the omission was probably that the practice was not general before the war.

the chairmanship of Sir Stephenson Kent, K.C.B., in 1918. The result of these two committees was the Act of 1919, which rigidly enforced the restitution of practices.

Perhaps it would not be unfair to say that this Act was unnecessary, and that in so far as effective safeguards were required, they were provided by the original Acts. But circumstances showed that complete restitution was in fact impracticable, and the trade unions realized that, if this were so, they were entitled to adequate compensation, which the further Act would secure for them.

(4) Full Value for Hours Worked. - This aspect of labour regulation may be regarded under the three main heads: - (a) the prevention of strikes and lockouts; (b) regulation of workshop discipline and hours through the Munitions Acts and particularly through munitions tribunals; and (c) the improvement of working conditions, under which is included the welfare work and the provision of housing.

It is not necessary here to deal with the original labour truce, the appointment of the committee on production, the provisions of the Munitions of War Acts and the Defence of the Realm Regulations, making strikes and lockouts and incitements thereto offences, and the work of the general munitions tribunals set up by the Munitions of War Acts to deal with strikers or employers guilty of lockouts. It is sufficient to say that any attempt to make a full use of available labour without regulation of strikes and lockouts is obviously doomed to failure, and therefore in so far as the methods adopted directly to prevent strikes and lockouts were successful an important aspect of labour regulation was adequately handled. But experience showed that it was not in the machinery for preventing disputes, so much as in the spirit operating among employers and workers, that the best security against industrial disputes lies. In the earliest days of the war, when the sense of national danger and of patriotism was at its highest, no machinery was devised or required. In the later years of the war, when continuous strain, disappointment, anxiety, and, above all, reflexion on what appeared to the workers were the huge profits made out of the war by employers, had strained tempers, elaborate machinery could not prevent such stoppages as the dilution strike of May 1917, or the Coventry " embargo " strike of 1918. No machinery, however perfect, can cure a disease of the spirit, and the ultimate sanction of all anti-strike legislation must be the willingness of those affected by it to accept its terms. Machinery without the right direction of labour policy, and without skilful officers in charge of the detailed working, would inevitably break down. The committee on production of itself - great and respected machine as it was - would have been ineffective but for the steady patriotism of both employers and workpeople as a whole, and for the unremitting and completely unrecognized efforts first of the Labour Department of the Board of Trade, then of the Ministry of Munitions, and finally of that Ministry, the Ministry of Labour and the Shipyard Labour Department of the Admiralty, to prove to the workers that whatever might be demanded of them was only demanded in the national interest. As prevention is better than cure, so conciliation is better than arbitration. Doctors are required, and arbitrators are vital, but it is the wise direction of policy that makes the task of the arbitrator a possible one. And, when full account is taken of the many mistakes that were made, the work of the conciliating departments played no small part in seeing that the available labour produced the munitions which won the " engineers' " war.

The munitions tribunals were set up by the first Munitions of War Act, 1915. They represented a compromise between in dustrial compulsion and voluntarism. Grave corn laints had been made that one of the principal causes Discipline. P P P of failure to produce the required output of munitions was the bad time-keeping both in shipyards and engineering establishments. Various causes for this were ascribed, most prominent among them being high wages and drunkenness. Acute controversy was aroused by allegations and counterallegations, and an official enquiry was instituted in 1915, the results of which were presented in a paper laid before Parliament on May I 1915, entitled " Report and Statistics of Bad Time Kept in Shipbuilding, Munitions and Transport Areas." The paper, though inconclusive, tended to show that, whatever the causes, there was in some areas room for improvement.

When, therefore, the first Munitions of War Act was introduced, with a general scheme for regulating labour, this aspect of the question could not be shelved. Nor could it be allowed to solve itself by the ordinary economic checks of peace-time. In peace-time the remedy for bad time-keeping, and generally of ineffective workmanship, is dismissal. With an acute shortage of labour, dismissal can only be resorted to in extreme cases. It was accordingly decided to make deliberately inefficient workmanship an offence by Section 4 (5) of the Munitions of War Act, 1915, which was as follows: " The employer and every person employed in the establishment shall comply with any regulations made applicable to that establishment by the Minister of Munitions with respect to the general ordering of work in the establishment with a view to attaining and maintaining a proper standard of efficiency and with respect to the due observance of the rules of the establishment.

" If the employer or any person so employed acts in contravention of, or fails to comply with, any such regulation, that employer or person shall be guilty of an offence under this Act." The offence thus created was a new one in law, and the first point to determine was whether it should be tried in the ordinary courts. After discussion in Parliament it was decided to set up munitions tribunals (Section 15, Ministry of War Act, 1915) of two classes - known respectively as general and local tribunals - to deal with all new offences created by the Munitions of War Act and with appeals in respect of leaving certificates under Section 7. The essential features of the tribunals were: (i.) The fact that the independent chairman was assisted by two assessors - one employer and one workman. Originally the assessors were merely advisory, but they were made a part of the court by the Act of 1916, which also provided for a woman assessor in cases affecting women.

(ii.) The comparative informality and the cheapness of their proceedings. These two points were emphasized in the munitions tribunals' rules governing the procedure of the tribunals. These rules provided first for the exceedingly low fees, and secondly that lawyers could not appear before the local tribunals, though representatives of the workmen could.

Like so many other of the instruments devised to meet war emergencies, the tribunals worked well, but not in the direction anticipated. It was expected in the first place that the general munitions tribunals, which were to deal with strikes and lockouts and employers' offences, would play a predominant part. The fact, however, was that except for six or seven notorious cases, such as the trial of the strikers at Fairfield's, at Glasgow, this class of tribunal rapidly receded into the background. For experience showed that actual prosecutions for the offence of striking had little result. To begin with, it was impracticable to lodge complaints against Io,000 men, and it was invidious to select among the offenders. In the second place, when imprisonment for failure to pay fines had been abolished by the Act of 1916, there was no certainty of recovery. And finally, even if recovery was possible, the individual did not suffer, since levies could always be raised to pay the fine. Indeed, so far as legal action in respect of strikes was effective it was the Defence of the Realm Act with its heavy penalties against incitement rather than the Munitions Acts that operated. But, though the general munitions tribunals were in fact little used yet none the less their existence was of great deterrent value.

So far as the local tribunals were concerned, their work in respect of workshop discipline formed in volume at any rate as time went on the lesser part of their heavy duties. They were worked hard, indeed sometimes almost overwhelmed, but their principal work consisted, so long as the leaving certificates remained, in dealing with appeals, and after their abolition with claims for failure to give notice and with questions arising upon claims for payment of wages under the orders issued by the Minister of Munitions under the powers vested in him by the Munitions Acts. So complex and difficult were these questions, and so liable to different interpretations by the fifty or sixty tribunals in existence, that it was found necessary under the Act of 1916 to provide for an appeal to the High Court in England and + o the Court of Session in Scotland. But the same principles of cheapness and informality marked the change and though the judicial decisions given had far-reaching results, they were given quickly with a minimum of expense to appellants and often without the assistance of counsel.

Section 4 (5) provided for regulations to be made by the Minister of Munitions for the general ordering of work in controlled establishments. When the bill passed into law the Minister of Munitions was faced with the difficulty of drawing up a code of workshop rules for the controlled establishments, the number of which increased from 134 on July 12 1915, to 2,422 on Jan. 11916, and ultimately exceeded 6,000. The difficulty of interfering with the delicate mechanism of workshop discipline by central edict was very much in the mind of the Ministry, and consequently the first regulations did not themselves make workshop rules but required the owner of a controlled establishment to post his own rules, thus giving them statutory effect.

This was an ingenious shortcut, but it failed in its object. The workmen were not prepared for possibly arbitrary rules, made to suit an employer's convenience, being made statutory. On their side the employers realized the reasonable nature of the workpeoples' objection, and moreover large numbers of the smaller employers had never drawn up a regular code of workshop rules. Accordingly in Aug. 1915 the Ministry of Munitions drew up a model code of rules for posting. These provided for regularity and diligence, suspension of restrictions, and sobriety and good order, bat the model rules did not of necessity supersede the existing workshop rules. The result of this step is shown by the following figures for Dec. 4 1915, in respect of establishments controlled by Nov. 4: - Certain difficulties arose subsequently in rules posted by employers, notably a rule imposing small fines for bad timekeeping. But these difficulties were ultimately surmounted by an agreement in the autumn of 1915 to substitute the Ministry of Munitions code for the unpopular rules.

Up to Dec. 1915 there had been 4,166 cases under Section 4 (5) before munitions tribunals, of which the great majority had been cases of bad time-keeping. It is a matter of real difficulty to decide whether convictions in this respect had or had not any real effect. It was often argued that the irritation caused by prosecutions far outweighed the advantages derived from convictions. However this may be, employers continued to revert with a certain freedom to this method, until the abolition of the leaving certificate. When this was abolished, the employer, through fear of losing workmen prosecuted, was far more chary of bringing prosecutions; indeed employers felt that the abolition of Section 7 carried with it the repeal of Section 4 (5) The Ministry of Munitions were conscious that legal proceedings in themselves would not necessarily cure the undoubted evil of bad time-keeping, which remained throughout the war, especially in the shipyards, a real menace to production. The causes were variously diagnosed, but there can be little doubt that the real causes were overstrain and high wages. To supplement the work of the tribunals the Ministry instituted a system of warning offenders, and appointed in this connexion a number of time-keeping officers, whose duty it was to investigate the time-keeping in the various controlled establishments and to put themselves into direct touch with culprits. It is difficult to show statistically what effect this policy had, but numerous testimonies to its good effects were received from employers.

But, if no direct results could be estimated, the indirect results of the efforts to deal with time-keeping were remarkable, provid ing another instance of permanent changes in the social structure arising from war measures. It was clear that overstrain was one of the effective causes of bad time-keeping, and that under the general head of overstrain must be included excessive hours, and unsatisfactory workshop and housing conditions. In the effort to repair these defects an important advance was made in the direction of elevating the position of workpeople generally.

The first indirect result of the bad time-keeping campaign was the encouragement of duly authorized workshop committees, which should themselves act as judges of their fellow workpeople. In the setting up of these committees - the Ministry of Munitions had to proceed very slowly, meat n y' p y y? Workdng and indeed were able to do little that was effective condi- until late in 1917. The employers regarded this inno- tons. vation with the greatest suspicion. Certain advanced employers (like Hans Renold, Ltd., at Manchester, and Messrs. Rowntree) had installed them with the most favourable results. But the employers generally regarded them as an attempt by the workpeople to interfere with management, and they were the less prepared to accept them in view of the activities of the labour movement known as the " shop-steward " or " rank and file " movement. This movement, which originated with the Clyde workers' committee, advocated workshop committees, partly as a means of countering the centralized powers of the trade unions, and partly as a means of reaching workshop control. When, therefore, the Ministry of Munitions urged upon employers' committees, which in everything except name were fundamentally different from those advocated by the shop stewards, the similarity of name and the possible misuse of any powers entrusted to the committees were powerful obstacles to progress. But the Ministry persevered, and a considerable number of these committees were set up, all of which, if only for the vigorous way in which they dealt with bad time-keeping, fully justified their creation. After the Coventry strike of 1918 the Engineering Employers' Federation signed an agreement with the engineering unions setting out the basis upon which committees might be established, thus setting the seal on the labour of the Ministry of Munitions in this respect. But the point of real interest is that in this work the Ministry of Munitions anticipated in practice on a very modest scale the far-reaching proposals of the committee under Mr. J. H. Whitley, M.P., which recommended the establishment of joint industrial councils for industries.

It would be untrue to allege that the control of hours, the provision of welfare facilities and the provision of housing, were undertaken primarily or indeed chiefly to cure bad time-keeping. These steps were necessary at least as much in the interests of the general moral of the workpeople as of the actual volume of production. But that bad time-keeping was an effective cause of the special attention given to these matters cannot be doubted. It was a consideration almost as much present to the industrial research committee, which investigated industrial fatigue, as to the Ministry of Munitions. It was certainly constantly in the mind of the welfare department of the Ministry of Munitions, and it was seriously taken into account by the Ministry in deciding on building schemes. Thus again from a war necessity were made contributions of first-rate importance to the whole future of industrial organization.

So far as hours of labour are concerned, it is sufficient here to note that the labour department of the Ministry of Munitions had a special responsibility as the labour side of the great supply department. The Home Office had the statutory duty under the Factory Acts of regulating the hours of women and young persons, but tradeunion rules were the only instrument that existed to control men's hours, and then not from the health, but from the economic point of view. The Home Office, faced by the urgent demands for munitions, the validity of which they were not able to estimate, had even so far as women and young persons were concerned great difficulty in maintaining hours at a reasonable level. So far as men's hours were concerned, in the early days of the war, working weeks of 80 and 90, and even loo, hours were by no means uncommon. It was upon the labour department of the Ministry of Munitions, which could in some measure control or at least estimate the demands of the supply departments, that the duty fell of attempting to bring hours down to a reasonable level. It was the Medical Research Committee, constituted by the Home Office, which pointed out the waste of energy and efficiency involved by excessive hours, but it was the labour department of the Ministry of Munitions which, by using their influence with the supply departments, were able to see that the views of the committee were carried out at least in part.

So far as welfare is concerned, here again the Ministry of Munitions 1,104 came in as the supply department, which, by reason of its intimate association with employers, could effectively supplement the statutory duties of the Home Office. It is doubtful how far the Ministry had any statutory basis for the important duties they discharged in this direction. But they had a power greater perhaps even than that of statute - the power of the purse. When the Department urged upon employers the provision of suitable canteens, rest-rooms and welfare superintendents, they could hope that their recommendations would be (as they generally were) accepted because they had power to write off the firms' expenditure in this respect against excess profits. But here again the interesting point that emerges is that the experiment of the Ministry of Munitions for meeting a war need has profoundly affected the attitude of employers generally to these problems.

Finally, so far as housing is concerned, the first point of interest is that by assuming direct responsibility for the provision of houses, the Ministry foreshadowed or perhaps even pointed the way to the great responsibility for the general housing of the population assumed after the war by the Ministry of Health. The State had admitted that for certain war purposes it had obligations in respect of housing; it was difficult to deny these obligations in the face of the even more clamant demands of peace.

Before leaving the subject of housing, a brief reference should be made to the Billeting of Civilians Act of 1917. When it became apparent that housing difficulties were proving a real obstacle to the production of munitions, and that it was hopeless to expect that new houses could be built in time to meet the need, the Government decided on the drastic step of introducing an Act, under which they took power to billet munitions workers compulsorily, if adequate accommodation were not forthcoming. A central billeting board was set up to carry the Act into effect, and billeting officers were appointed. In fact, the principal value of the Act proved to be the threat of compulsion. In place of making orders, the general procedure was to hold conferences in the most congested districts, which generally resulted in the provision of increased accommodation without the need of a resort to compulsion. Though figures could not easily be obtained to support the view it is probable that the Act had a considerable success.

(5) The Handling of Wages Problem. - Any account of labour regulation would be incomplete which did not indicate the degree to which success or failure in handling the wages problem may affect the whole labour situation. During the war, wages did not have quite so predominant a share in moulding the point of view of workmen to industrial questions as during peace. Questions such as dilution, and compulsory military service, took their place side by side with wages as topics of first-class importance to labour. But none the less a failure to deal with wages would have constituted a failure to regulate labour. Clear above all the conflicting considerations that remain when the general Government policy is considered there stand out the two great experi ments in handling wages - (a) com p ulsory arbitration, and (b) fixing of wages by administrative orders.

Compulsory arbitration had long formed the subject of controversy, and had long been repudiated by labour opinion, on the plain ground that such arbitra ion necessarily destroyed the right to strike. Labour opinion, though fully conscious of the economic wastefulness of this desperate resort, regarded it none the less as the ultinza ratio. The right to resort to it had been finally consecrated by the Trade Disputes Act of 1906, and any interference with or reduction of the extreme right was regarded as a vital attack on the general liberties of labour. But the war proved in the end too strong even for this view. For the first few months, in the general engineering and shipbuilding trades, wages did not play any very considerable part. Overtime to an unheard-of extent was being worked, and unemployment was non-existent for any man who cared to work; so that rates of wages could safely be left to look after themselves. But as the shortage of labour grew more and more pronounced, a sharp change came over the situation. Employers began to bid against one another; and disparities between one factory and another, and between one district and another, began to have an effect on the minds of the workpeople. Moreover, at the beginning of 1915 an old-standing difficulty between employers and employed in the Clyde reemerged, and the atmosphere began to be charged with a certain liveliness. But over and above this there was a genuine reluctance among workpeople to put themselves in the position of striking, and thus ceasing to produce the munitions of which their brothers in the field were so urgently in want. It was principally this factor, though the others were also material, that made it possible, when the Treasury agreement forbidding strikes and lockouts was concluded, to couple with that provision the institution of arbitration, which by the Munitions of War Act, 1915, became compulsory.

It cannot be pretended that at any time the strongly organized part of the labour world welcomed or approved of compulsory arbitration, but equally it cannot be denied that the principle was legally accepted. The statistics of comput> strikes and lockouts during the war period indeed 7 0 A rbishow that the principle was by no means universally accepted, but in weighing the statistics account must be taken of the fact that all the most considerable strikes were unconnected with wages. But, even allowing for a considerable body of strikes on wages and even against decisions of the compulsory tribunals, the experiment must be considered to have been successful. It is therefore the more surprising that labour opinion should have been so little converted to its use.

The reasons for this are not far to seek. In the first place it is one thing to abandon the strike weapon during war, when it operates as much against the strikers as against the employers. It is quite another thing to abandon or even to restrict its use during peace. In the second place, from the labour point of view, compulsory arbitration during a period of acute labour shortage and rising prices resolved itself into a question of determining only how much wages should be advanced, and never how much they should be reduced. And finally there existed the ordermaking powers of the Ministry of Munitions, which could be, and indeed constantly were, resorted to, as an alternative to, and as a means of evading, compulsory arbitration.

On the general effect of compulsory arbitration it may fairly be said that, though its compulsory character was abandoned with the termination of the war except in so far as it was kept alive for a strictly limited period by the Wages (Temporary Regulation) Acts, it had familiarized great masses of workpeople to the principle of arbitration, whether compulsory or not. In this way, by pointing to a central settlement of labour questions without resort to industrial warfare, the system of compulsory arbitration has had enduring effects.

Side by side with the awards of the arbitration tribunals, and only too often conflicting with them, there came into existence the direct power of the Ministry of Munitions to make orders. As between awards and orders it is sufficient to say here that, while there is a great deal try o fnis- to be said for orders, whether direct or through a trade organization, in respect of unorganized trades, it is difficult in theory to defend orders in respect of organized trades. But theory in war-time has a habit of being ineffective. The critics who point scornfully to what they regard as the disaster of the repeal of Section 7 and the granting of the i 2 a bonus, have this advantage over those responsible for these measures. They see what happened as a result of their introduction: they do not, however, see what was avoided. They are therefore ready to assume that the difficulties avoided are negligible in comparison with those created. Nothing can controvert them, except possibly the fact that in spite, it may even be as a result, of measures such as these in face of unspeakable strain and anxiety, the working classes remained resolutely, loyally, and with but trifling interruptions, at work till Nov. 11 1918.

The origin of the order-making power is to be found in the prosecution of the Government's proposals for dilution. The principal stumbling block at the end of 1915 was the fear that the introduction of semi-skilled men and women upon work hitherto performed by skilled men would depress the level of the wages. The trade unions demanded that the Government should take powers to prevent that depression. These powers were taken under Sections 6, 7 and 8 of the Munitions of War Act, 1916, which enabled the Minister of Munitions (1) to make orders concerning the wages, hours of labour and conditions of employment, (a) of women employed on munitions work in establishments subject to the provisions of Section 7 of the principal Act, and (b) of certain classes of semi-skilled and unskilled men employed in controlled establishments; and also (2) to constitute special arbitration tribunals, (a) to deal with differences in the matters mentioned above, and (b) to advise the Minister on questions referred to them affecting such matters.

This order-making power was assumed by the Minister of Munitions as an indispensable preliminary to securing dilution. It is important to note that the orders, so far as women were concerned, were of two classes: the first, and for this purpose the less important, were those which dealt with women engaged on what was previously men's work; the second with women on women's work. These orders, dealing as they did with practically unorganized trades, for the first time in general industry, introduced an effective underpinning minimum. The first order fixed 20S. per week as the minimum, representing in itself a 6s. to 8s. advance over the average wage previously enjoyed by women in industry. From that time, with the steadily increasing cost of living, the women's rate mounted steadily till it reached the neighbourhood of 35s. There are those who maintain that these last rates were excessive. There are none, however, who dare pretend that the pre-war level was adequate. The action of the Ministry of Munitions had destroyed the old standards, which never returned, for the Wages (Temporary Regulation) Acts, temporarily, and the Trade Board Act, 1918, permanently, stepped in to uphold the standard thus fixed. When, therefore, the wages policy of the Government is criticised, it is only fair to remember that the women's wages orders of the Ministry of Munitions opened a new era in women's employment.

But, if these orders can be defended, it will be more difficult to find those who would accept a defence of the order giving the 122% bonus in the autumn of 1917. Yet when this order is criticised, the stages that led up to it should be remembered. The introduction of the automatic machine and mass production had afforded unprecedentedly high wages to semi-skilled and unskilled workers employed on piece-work. Side by side with those working on operations which, because of their delicacy, could not be performed on a piece-work basis, were the skilled men, whose wages had by no means advanced at an equal rate. Not only, therefore, had the relative wage superiority of the skilled man not been maintained, but in many cases the less skilled worker - who had often been taught by the skilled man - was receiving a higher wage than his teacher. This grievance - which was generally known as the skilled man's grievance - had been noticed by all the commissions on industrial unrest appointed after the May strike of 1917 under the general chairmanship of Mr. Barnes. They were unanimous in declaring that it should be remedied, but not unanimous as to the means. The 121% bonus given on the advice of the labour side of a mixed committee appointed to consider the matters was the means adopted by the Government. Designed to remove the disparity between skilled and unskilled, it was ultimately extended to time and pieceworkers skilled and unskilled alike. It is clear that it did not achieve its object of removing the disparity; that it was extremely expensive, and that during the days when it was first imposed it led to much confusion and grave irritation. But what is not clear is whether, if it had not been granted as an earnest proof of the Government's sincere determination to remedy a labour grievance, other troubles of a deeper and more formidable sort, of which angry signs had already appeared, might not have developed. Admittedly, only an acute emergency could justify the attempt to regulate the general wages of the country by central order. (H. WF.) II. United States Before the World War there was no national American system of labour placement. There were thousands of employment agencies of every type (commercial fee-charging agencies, philanthropic offices, union, employers' and commercial association offices, Federal, state and municipal agencies), competing, duplicating and working at cross purposes. War-time demands for labour soon overstrained the existing facilities. The flow of immigrants stopped; the draft drew off large numbers of men; war industries bid against each other in competition for workers; there was little contraction of non-essential industries. By the spring of 1918 the surplus had been absorbed, and war labour needs had reached the total of 3,928,956 workers. The problem was one both of distribution and training. To meet the war emergency, the U.S. Employment Service and the U.S. Training and Dilution Service were established.

The first plan to establish a Federal employment service was inaugurated by the Bureau of Immigration in 1907 for the purpose of placing immigrants on farms. In Jan. 1915 it was extended to cover all occupations and all classes of workers, and effort was made to cooperate with state bureaus. A special division of " reserves " (public service reserves and boys' working reserve) was created to enroll skilled workers and to enlist boys between 16 and 21 for vacation work. In Jan. 1918 the Secretary of Labor ordered the separation of the employment service from the bureau of immigration and a few months later when the Department of Labor was reorganized, the United States Employment Service was made one of its eight new divisions. Two million dollars was granted to it from the President's emergency fund.

The service passed through several stages of reorganization. In its final form it consisted of five divisions: - (r) the control division, which was in charge of general correspondence, statistics and research, expenditures and accounts; (2) the field organization division, which supervised the employment offices; (3) the clearance division, which handled reports on labour supply and distributed unfilled requests for help; (4) the personnel division, which dealt with the selection and training of help and worked out standard classifica ions of occupations; and (5) the information division, which published the U.S. Employment Service Bulletin and had charge of all publicity work. Responsibility for organization was centred in a Federal director in each state. State advisory boards, consisting of representative employers and workers, were organized, as well as community labour boards. Dependence of employers on the service was further increased when, on Aug. 1 1918, by Presidential proclamation, all employers engaged in war industries, who employed more than 100 persons, were required to hire their unskilled labourers through the service. By Oct. 1918, 832 offices had been opened, covering every state, the District of Columbia and Porto Rico. Special divisions were organized for woman labour, railway labour, farm labour, shipyard labour, longshoremen, negro labour, mine labour and engineers.

Following the cessation of hostilities a plan was worked out for the placement of ex-soldiers and war workers. Lack of adequate funds, however, forced the service to curtail its work, and by Oct. 1919 all of the offices were closed except those which the states and municipalities took over. These were granted a small sum of money and remained in cooperation with the Federal office. During the period from Oct. II 1919 to June 30 1920, 269 such offices were in operation in 41 states and the District of Columbia, supported mostly by state and municipal funds.

Though the service had many weaknesses and shortcomings, due mainly to the fact that it was created under pressure to relieve a disorganized labour market, it accomplished remarkable results, as the following table shows: Credit for its success must be given, also, to some of the wellorganized state services which had existed for several years.

As in other countries during the war, the labour shortage was overcome in part by the increased employment of women, who entered industry in large numbers, particularly after the second draft. In a study recently made from Ohio statistics, it has been shown that there was no marked increase of employers' demands for women until March 1918, but that from then to March 1919 there was a much stronger demand for women workers than before the war. In fact, just before the termination of the war, employers were asking for twice as many women workers as in 1917. The figures show, also, that the number of women seeking industrial employment rose in almost exact proportion to the demand for their services. In another study, made for the country as a whole, of 15,000 firms employing 2,500,000 workers, it is estimated that in 1914 6.5% of the workers on the labour force of leading war agency and implement industries were women; in 1916 7.7% were women; after the first draft (Feb.- March 1918) Io 6% were women; after the second draft (Oct.- Nov. 1918) 13.9% were women. In Aug. 1919 women still remained as io% of the labour force. In the production of munitions, Benedict Crowell, Assistant Secretary of War and Director of Munitions, says that the women played a " highly important part." Fifty per cent of the employees in explosive plants were women; in the manufacture of hand grenades 19 out of 20 workers were women; in the Government gas-mask defence plant 8,50o out of 12,000 employees were women. In transportation the highest employment of women was reached in Oct. 1918, when there were 101,785 employed by first-class roads, an increase of 66% in the first nine months of 1918 and of 225% from the beginning of the war. In Oct. 1919 the number had fallen to 81,803. This increase in the war industries was secured in part by the absolute increase in numbers of women employed and in part by a shift from the traditional occupations of women in the textile, garment, food and tobacco industries which showed in some instances actual decrease in the numbers employed.

Women were first substituted for men in hundreds of repetitive occupations, and in unskilled and labouring jobs, in industries varying in their main divisions from blast furnaces to lumber camps. More important for the future was the fact that the war emergency in some cases opened the way to the " master machines " and key occupations. In all the industries taken together where women were substituted, 98 to 100 men were released for every ioo women employed, though there were exceptions such as crane operating where three women on 8-hour shifts replaced two men on 12-hour shifts. With regard to the success of their work in the new occupations a recent study of representative firms where women were substituted for men shows that 77.4% of the firms investigated reported that women's work, where comparable, was as satisfactory as, or better than, that of men. On the whole the results of their work seemed to depend less on the kind of work or degree of skill required than upon the intelligence with which they were initiated into their new work.

To meet the demand for technically skilled labour, the training and dilution service of the Department of Labor was organized, July 16 1918, under the authority of the War Labor Administration Act, and $150,000 was appropriated for its use. Its particular function was to ascertain the best methods of training workers and to provide information. Plans for factory training were designed, the various types of training were classified, and information was widely disseminated among employers. Especially was training needed for women, who were, with few exceptions, unprepared for the skilled and semi-skilled work. This was usually given in the factory training-room or vestibule school. Though the life of the service was so brief that it had no appreciable effect in augmenting the supply of skilled labour, it accomplished an important result in emphasizing the need for industrial training.

BIBLIOGRAPHY.-U.S. Department of Labor, Women's Bureau, Bulletin No. z2; U.S. Department of Labor, Bureau of Labor Statistics, Monthly Labor Review; Report of Benedict Crowell, Assistant Secretary of War, Director of Munitions, Washington, 1919; America's Munitions, 1917-8; U.S. Department of Labor, Employment Service, Annual Reports of the Director-General; U.S. Railroad Administration, Annual Reports of the Director-General; National Industrial Conference Board, Research Report, No. 8; Gordon S. Watkins, Labor Problems and Labor Administration in the United States During the World War, University of Illinois Studies in the Social Sciences, vol. viii., No. 3; Lescohier, D.D., The Labor Market, 1919. (J. R. Co.)

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