The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1868-05-23 00:00:00

A TREATY BETWEEN CAPITAL AND
LABOUR.

The story of a treaty between Capita/ and Labour Is admir-
ably told in the Sixth Report of the Trades' Union Commh.
&ion, which has just appeared, remarks the Times in &leader,
and time proceeds to describe the working of the mode—
Messrs. Briggs & Co. had been for some time the
proprietorA of large collieries in the West Yorkshire
district, when they found themselves compelled, in I
190, to place their establishments on a completely dif-
ferent footing. Strikes, quarrela, complaints, and
" playdays had become so common that the business
was unmanageable. Hardly a fortnight passed with-
out its day or two of stoppage, and the miners—it is
Mr. Briggs himself who tells the story—" seemed
utterly reckless as to what loss they inflicted" upon
their employers and fellow-workmen. At this con-
juncture, then, and under the pressure of these dif-
ficulties, the firm adopted the resolution of admitting
their workpeople to a participation in the profits of the
concern. The old partnership was dissolved, and in
its place was constituted a new company, under the
Limited Liability Act. The capital was divided into
9,000 shares of £lO each, of which number the old pro-
prietors retained in their own hands 6,000, or two-thirds
of the whole, and the rest were offered to the work-
men and the public. But this was not the whole of
the scheme. It was announced that after the compu-
tation of profits at the end of the year a distribution
would be made on the following terms :-10 per cent,
, covering all charges, was to be allotted to capital, and
if any excess of profits then remained it was to be
divided into two equal parts, one part to go in further
remuneration of capitaL and the other to be distributed,
in the shape of a bonus proportioned to earnings, among
all persona—miners, agents, or servants—employed in

the collieriea. It will be observed that, according to
this system, the old proprietors, as holders of a ma-
jority of the shares, would still possess the control of
the business, but the workpeople, on the other hand,
would have the privilege of taking shares if they
pleased, and would enjoy the prospect of a bonus
whether they took shares or not. :Nothing could be
more remarkable than the results of this experiment,
as related before the Commission, by the IllAiteri firs;
and by the men themselves afterwards.
The scheme, although it was distrusted at first, and
although comparatively few shares have been takes
by the colliers, was entirely successful. There has
been no strike at the works from that time to this. A
far better feeling has been established between masters
and men, and the men themselves have become more
orderly, prudent, and frugal. The Trade ITnions
have no longer any hold upon them, and Mr. Briggs
' expressed his belief that it would be impracticable to
re-open any of the old disputes. Financially, too,
the experiment has succeeded. Before the change the
old firm rarely obtained a profit of 10 per cent, on their
capital • indeed, in some years they had only 5. Sinai
the introduction of the new system not only has the 10
per cent, been uniformly forthcoming, but a sub.
stantial surplus has remained for division as above
described, Every workman, therefore, has obtained
not only the average wages of the district, but a per-
centage upon those wages in the form of a bonus,
besides the privilege of becoming a shareholder, and
getting a handsome profit upon his share. We are
told, indeed, that these shares are now at 20 per cent.
premium, though still the number held by working
colliers is small, the latest revision of the register
showing only 264 shares in the hands of the workmen.
All this time, however, the original owners have been
far more like masters than ever. Mr. Briggs stated
that they had " very much more control" over the
men than formerly, and that whereas while they were
nominally sole proprietors they had very little authce
rity, they had now absolute mastery over the pro-
perty, and were "infinitely more proprietors than
before."

If we examine the nature of the scheme, we shall
find much to remark. It is not in reality an example
of the Co-operative system, nor would it by any mean.
satisfy the advocates of pure Socialism. The plan
consisted, not in the indiscriminate extension of owner-
ship to the mass of the men, but in the elevation of •
select few of them to that dignity. A certain number
were brought, as the political phrase goes, "within the
pale of the Constitution," while those still outside
received a gratuity in consideration of good behaviour.
Mr. Briggif had reasoned from the fact that in coal.
mining sonic 85 per cent, of the whole expenditure
came within the control of the workpeople. The
wages of manual labour amount to 70 per cent., and
15 per cent, is represented by the cost of stores and
materials. If, therefore, the labourers could be induced
to waste no work, and to economize as far as possible
the consumption of stores, fou'r-fifths at least of the
expenses of mining might be favourably affected and
the result be found in the profits of the year. That is
precisely what has happened. The men only "co-
operate" with their masters in the sense of working
cheerfully and fairly towards the same end. They
could only become partners to a limited extent, how-
ever much they might desire to do so, and they have
but very partially availed themselves of this privilege,
, At the same time there are shareholders among them,
and these shareholders could verify the accounts of the
concern if they thought proper. As a matter of fact,
we are told that no proposal of this sort has ever been
made, nor any question asked about the books or the
balance-sheet, although the actual profits, even during
this period of prosperity, have been far below the
amount which the men had always imagined.
One or two other facts deserve notice, but will hardly
appear surprising. It needs the intervention of the
controlling proprietors to prevent the workmen from
being hard upon each other. The shareholding miners
grudge the non-shareholders their bonus. As soon as
ever a man buys a share he "takes the side I,f the
capitalists and becomes a capitalist in his notions."
showing, in fact, considerably less regard fur labour
than the capitalist on a larger scale. It is clear, how-
ever, that the great majority of the men do something
for their bonus—that is, they abstain from throwing
away, as they used to do, the profits of the concern by
careless working and indifference, and if any miner
still sins in this respect he is marked by the rest. As
to the Unions, they abominate the whole experiment,
though their opposition is ascribed not so much to any
jealousy on the part of the Unionists themselves as to
the anger of the paid delegates, who find their occu-
pation gone. One of these itinerant orators actually
spoke of the scene of unity, profit, and prosperity at
Messrs. Briggs's collieries as " a black pall overhang-
ing the district."
It will naturally be asked with some interest how far
so successful an experiment can be applied in other
directions, or to what extent it may be assumed to
establish the advantage of the Co-operative principle.
On the former point it is reasonably represented that
the saving here effected cannot be anticipated in cases
where no similar margin for saving exists. Mr. Briggs
knew very well that in the work of coal mining the
'Milers had the power of securing by careful, or destroy-
ing by careless, work the profit of the year's enterprise,
and he devised the bonus system as an inducement to
keep them straight. But in many trades and industries
there is no such margin at the workman's command,
and consequently no such profits to be realised by
individual care. As to the Co-operative system pure
and simple—that is to say, a pure Republic of work.
people representing capital, labour, arid power altoge-
ther—both masters and men combine in assuring us
that it would never answer in coal mining. Mr. Brig,,,is
thinks the men may be gradually "educated 1111 to it,"
but the educatiou has yet to conic, while the witnesses
from the working class look upon the prospect with
equal misgiving. In point of fact, there is no " co.
operation" in the scheme before us, except the co-
operation of willing and unsuspicious workmen with
straightforward and liberal masters; hut the practical
success has been so clear that the principle deserves ea-
-I,rognitioa wherever it can be appaed.