The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1885-05-30 00:00:00

CO-OPERATIVE CONGRESS AT
OLDHAM.

The seventeenth annual congress of the Central
Co-operative Board was opened on Monday morning
in the King-street Co-operative Hall, Oldham. There
were 600 delegates present.

Mr. Lloyd Jones delivered an inaugural address,
and, intimated that he treated the subject of co-
operition from the inside, being an early worker in
the cause. The work of co-operation was undertaken
from the conviction that the evils of society needed
correction. The present system of distributive co-
operation had been the growth of years. • It had been
tested by severe, extensive, and long-tried experi-
ments, and had come out of the trial triumphantly.
Forethought and thrift had been encouraged and
developed amongst the poorer classes. With re-
gard to the development of the system the Roch-
dale 28 of 41 years ago had grown into 700,000
members, for the most part heads of families. One
of the results of the great movement was that they
might claim as the distinguishing characteristic of the
work that they had not tried to make those that
suffer content with their condition. On the con-
trary, they had endeavoured to excite their discontent,
not against the arrangements and decrees of Provi-
dence, but against the stupidity and injustice of men
who sought to excuse their blunders by claiming for
them the character of providential decrees. The dis-
content they excited was not against men or classes of
men, but against social arrangements and business
usages that, being productive of misery to society, re-
quired careful but speedy rectification. The next
movement of co-operative distribution obtained its
highest sanction for its increase of members and
growth of business. Those who entered it were
satisfied that the interests of all were care-
fully guarded, and the results of all equally dis-
tributed. The questions to be discussed by the
co-operative body henceforth were not those Of the
quality or pract:cability of the work in hand, so much
as how its operation and development might be carried
out how to make more perfect the work set on foot,
and how to open up in connection with the co-
operative principle nerr- practical developments and
new outlets of activity. Mr. Jones went on to show
the importance ef co-operative teaching, directed
specially to the cultivation of co-operative thought,
and the stimulation of co-operative action for the
great end they had in view, urging that all en-
gaged in the work should be treated not only with
confidence and respect, but with generosity.
Corning on to productive co-operation, he charac-
terised it as more difficult than mere distribution,
but, admitting the many difficulties they had to
face, he urged that there was nothing more cer-
tain than co-operative production, being a
necessity in the movement, would never cease its
experiment until it was as much a success as distribu-
tive co-operation. The work of the Wholesale
Society and the various manufactures inaugurated
and sustained by co-operators were touched upon, and
the latter portion of the address was devoted to a
review of the joint-stock movement, which had taken
so great a hold, in the shape of cotton mills, in the
Oldham district, where about 80 of these mills might
be found within 'a radius of only three miles. He
expressed the hope that the present Congress would
result in closer union, and in the making of their
resolution more determined and their energies more
active for the accomplishment of the great work
which lay before them.

In the afternoon the Conference, which had ad-
journed for luncheon, resumed, when a discussion
took place on a report of the inquiry committee on
"Co-operative Production.' The Congress was dis-
appointed that the committee had not formulated a
scheme for the utilisation of surplus capital, and a
resolution asking the new committee to do so was
passed. A paper was next read by Mr. Hardern
(Oldham) on "The Limited Liability Movement." In
the discussion which followed, Mr. E. 0. Greening
(London) condemned the system, and pointed out
that while joint stock companies made only 5 per
cent. the co-operative societies in that district made
47 per cent. Mr. Brearley (Oldham) said that mill-
workers and mechanics had invested their money in.
joint stock companies, and were now living on the
proceeds. Joint stock enterprise had made more
working-men wealthy than any other. The Congress
then adjourned.