The potters herald. [volume] (East Liverpool, Ohio) 1899-1982, 1940-12-12
LABOR NEWS
FROM BRITAIN
. DRIVE LAUNCHED
. TO CUT ACCIDENTS
. TELL GERMANS
. TRUTH ABOUT WAR

Vigorous measures are being taken,
on the initiative Of the Minister of
Labor, Ernest Bevin, to lessen the
number of accidents in factories and
workshops.
Under war conditions, and with the
entry into industry of new workers
who have to learn the elements of
safety regulations, there has been a
disturbing increase in the number of
accidents.
In the first six months of the war,
Bevin told newspapermen the other
day, the number of fatal accidents in
industry increased by AZ per cent, and
the number of non-fatal accidents by
13 per cent.
Admittedly much of the increase
is due to the larger number of work.
people in employment and the longer
hours worked in industry. Black-out
conditions have contributed to the in
crease of accidents. Speeding-up of
production also contributed. But ac-
cidents, whatever their cause, Ernest
Bevin declared in a striking phrase,
are "a bonus for the enemy"
He has therefore sanctioned an in
tensive campaign in the workshops
for the prevention of accidents. The
Factory Department of his Ministry,
which he took over from the Home
Office with its staff of experienced
inspectors, is responsible for the
scheme. But he has also invoked the
help Of the National Safety First AS
sociation which has had more than
20 years experience of the problem
and has initiated many useful meth
DDS, adopted by progressive firms, to
reduce accident rates.
X x X
Workers to Cooperate
Special Safety Officers will carry
on an intensive campaign in every
factory and will develop a works
safety organization in cooperation
with the managements, foremen, and
the workers themselves.
Literature and posters are to be
supplied to the factories setting forth
the fundamentals of works safety,
outlining the safety code, and ex-
planning the responsibilities resting
both upon the management and the
workers themselves in organizing an
accident prevention service and first
, aid.
Emphasis is laid particularly upon
the need of first-aid treatment for
, injuries which seem at first sight to
be trivial. Even in peace time there
| are about 10000 actual cases Of
blood-poisoning every year in indus
| try, which are sufficiently serious to
cause at least three days of lost time.
Sepsis is thus serious problem,
but it can be met by preventive meas
ures of a quite simple character in
!; cluding proper system of dressing
and redressing of minor injuries.
Ernest Bevin insists upon cooper
alton. The smallest works, it is sug-
gested, can form a useful safety COM
mittee of three-the manager, fore
man and one representative of the
workers.
Trade UniOnism Grows
Alfred Wall, many years secretary
of the London Trades Council, and
now the principal officer of highly
organized body Of craftsmen in the
printing trades, the London Society
of Compositors, was busy in pre-
: pairing a broadcast to German work
ers when l dropped into his office the
other day.
He was taking as the basis of his
talk the official figures just pub
lished by the Chief Registrar of
Friendly Societies, showing the
growth of the British Trade Unions
in the period in which the Nazi Die
tatorship had been Systematically de-
stroying the foundations Of working
class freedom in Germany.
In 1888, when Hitler usurped power
in Germany there were in the British
Unions 4,392,O00 men and women.
At the end of 1889 there were 1884,
900. There has been a great influx in
the last nine months, and Alfred Wall
did not think it an exaggeration to
say that there are probably now
seven million.
Their influence has grown with
their numbers.
Alfred Wall proposed to tell the
German workers how the Unions un-
der our system of Government freely
assumed great responsibilities when
the war began, and how the Govern
ment accepted their full cooperation
in organizing industry for war pur-
poses.
All Government departments, when
the war came, received an instruction
from the Prime Minister that they
:;