Morning journal and courier., 1892-09-13
WAGES ON ENGLISH f RAILWAYS.

WAGES ON ENGLISH RAILWAYS. H
The Subject One of Present Interest
to the American Public - More
Than Four Billions OF Dollars of
Capital Invested and Upwards of
Three Hundred and Fifty TLous-
and Employees Comparatively
Good Wages and Satisfactory Re-
lations From an English Stand
point.
LONDON, Aug. 81.
The railway lines of Great Britain and
Ireland cover in all about twenty thousand
miles. The money invested in them is re-
turned at something like four and a half
billion dollars. Last year the total mum
Der of passenger journeys, exclusive of
those by season ticket holders, was S45,-
463, ,6SS. These figures were given by Sir
George Findlsy in his recent testimony
before the royal commission on labor.
They are interesting, yet rather confus-
ing. They bswilder more than they en-
tighten us. But when we learn from the
same source that in carrying forward the
immense railway traffic of this busy little
island upwards of three hundred and fifty
Thousand men are employed, We feel as
though we had come upon fact which
is at once practical and comprehensive,
and when it is intimated that we pro-
pose in this letter to throw little light
large force of British workmen, we shall
surely have suggested what to the Amer
ican public, just at this time, will be
topic of the very deepest moment.
On this side the wages of railway men
is not very live topic. A university
lecturer has just pointed to the English
railway companies as the best employers
of labor in the whole realm, and in
proof of his position he instances the
general spirit of content which prevails
in the railway service and the marked
tendency of railway men to bring up
their children in the same calling. In a
similar vein of complscency were the re-
marks of Sir George Findlay before the
royal commission. This gentleman is at
the head of the biggest railway the coun-
try can boast, and what he says is that
generally the relations between the rail
way companies and the men are satisfac-
tory" The most convincing proof of this
is, he says, "thst the great body of rail
way servants exhibit such high state of
discipline and such cheerful performance
of duty as could only be the result of their
meeting with fair and considerste treat
ment on the part of their employers"
When, too, we add to such testimony AS
this the statement made to us the other
day by Mr.. Edward Hartford, general sec
retary of the Amalgamated Society of
Railway Servants, viz, that there had new
er been strike on the part of this class
of workers for increased pay. but only for
reduction of hours, 1t would really ap-
pear as though English railway men were
a class who, in comparison with other
British workmen, are generously paid and
fairly we'll off in the world.
Admitting the correctness of this view,
the question of what these favored men
are paid for the duties they so cheerfully
perform, far from losing any of the inter
est attaching to it, is at once invested, for
Americans at least, with an interest tnat
is altogether extraordinary; for when this
question shall have been given an authori
tative answer light will have been cast
upon other important topics. From the
point of view thus afforded we shall be
able to see definitely what fair treatment
of employees by their employers means in
this country, and what in England is
deemed fair compensation for q dutiful
and efficient workman. If railway wages
are found to range high, the conclusion
from this fact will be favorable to English
workers in general, for it will raise the
presumption that none of them may be SO
very badly off, even though some are low
er down in the scale of pay than others;
and, of course, in that case all round con-
gratulations will be in order. If, how
ever, it shall transpire that, spite of their
apparent contentment, and notwithstand
ing the testimonies quoted above, railway
servants are paid only q low wage, the
conclusions to which we shall be led, and
the feelings which must result therefrom,
will inevitably be of q different kind.
We were delighted to find here such an
organization as the Amalgsmsted Society
of Railway Servants. Within few weeks
that 1t represents now the entire United
Kingdom. Its membership, increased last
year by 8, ,460, aggregates at present about
thirty thousand, and it has sinews of war
safely invested to the amount of over five
hundred and fifty Thousand dollars. From
these facts the reader will get some idea
both of the standing of the society itself
and of the influence and general reliabili-
ty of its secretary, MIR. Edward Hartford.
With this gentleman we enjoyed pleas
ant and profitable interview, and one of
the first questions we asked was a ques-
ton which had occurred to us after read
ing in one of the English papers a prize
essay on (which ia the Best Railway in
Grsat Britain" The writer, we found,
had lodged the main point. There were
four, he said, each of which excelled in
some particular thing, but all of which,
considered generally, were about equal
the London and Northwestern, the Mid
land, the Great Northern and the Great
Western. Upon the point of how these
great corporations treated their men, the
essayist had nothing to say, and on that
account his production, to one in our frame
we had desired to know was-Which of
the English railway companies pays the
best wages3 and this was the question
which we put squarely at Mr.. Hartford.
But that gentleman found 1t to be poser.
He could only say, in reply, that the best
average wages were paid by the great trunk
lines, the lines singled out for special praise
in the prize essay We had read.
Between these four controlling lines
choice. The London and Northwestern
had the reputation for paying its signal
men little better than some of the others,
but its shunters and brakesmen it paid
worse than others. Perhaps, too, the
Great Western might be mentioned, he
said, as affording the best pay to conduc-
tors of freight trains These are called
here goods guards, and what we sought at
once to find out was what the best English
pay for this class of railway men amount
ed to; and We were told that it was thirty
two shillings and sixpence a week, making
it fall little below eight dollars. But
this whole question of compensation, Mr..
Hartford observed, had been treated fully
by his society in o document entitled "Re-
turn of the Hours of Duty and Rates of
Wages Paid to Railway Servants on the
Principal Lines in Great Britain, in Ope-
ration, May, 1884," and q copy of this doc-
ument he placed at our disposal. This