for holding branch meetings, etc., and so would in time become recognised as the only centres where the best information (which might be of use to the unemployed) could be obtained.

Desirability 18. At present there is a great difficulty experienced, of exchange when sending applicants a long distance from the excharge assisting men where they register, to a possible employer, as the men, travelling to in the majority of cases, do not possess the means necessary seek work. to pay the ordinary cost of travelling. This could be met by the employment exchanges being placed in a position to obtain from all transit authorities, special workmen's fares in all bona-fide cases.

Government 19. It would materially assist the success of the exand public bodies should changes if the Government and all public bodies inserted a clause in their contracts that their works' departments and contractors should, as far as possible, utilise the machinery of the exchanges for such labour as they require from time to time.

use labour exchanges.

Need of extension of system over whole of London.

Advantages of national system of exchanges.

Attitude of trade unions to labour exchanges.

Attitude of employers.

20. In completing arrangements as far as London is concerned, it is necessary that the exchange system should be extended to the cities of London and Westminster, and, in fact, to the whole of Greater London.

General.

21. In order that a scheme of employment exchanges can become really effective a national system should be put into operation. By this means a complete organisation of unorganised labour would be effected.

22. The advantages of this would be, the supply of labour available in all parts of the country could be accurately gauged, and could from time to time be moved to wherever required, and the known surplus could be promptly dealt with in Government schemes of afforesta tion, reclamation, emigration, etc.

23. The lack of organisation generally, at present, is responsible for much of the chronic unemployment prevailing. Trades that are already overstocked still receive more fresh blood than is necessary, while extreme difficulty is found in skilled industries to obtain necessary hands.

24. The exchanges would be able to tell the exact condition of every trade in the country, and divert youths about to enter business life to occupations where their services would more likely be permanently required.

25. The need for labour in country districts could be met by placing men from the towns who have received an agricultural training, and thus relieve the pressure in large centres.

26. An important point, which we think ought to have serious consideration, is, that if the local advisory committees (consisting of public men, local employers, and representatives of labour) were legally constituted they could become arbitration courts and wages boards.

27. There can be no question but that an organisation such as has been outlined above would greatly improve the status of labour in poorly paid industries.

28. As the exchanges become more extensively used, employers of even sweated labour would be compelled to come to the exchanges for the supply of hands, and the fact that the prices they were paying would be collated and at the disposal of applicants for employment, would, we believe, constitute a considerable check on the evils of the sweating system.

29. Since the commencement of the work of employment exchanges, we have been anxious to work with the trades unions, but, unfortunately, up to the present we have not received their co-operation, and much of the criticism that has been levelled against us accusing us of employing cheap or sweated" labour, has, we believe, been due to the lack of sympathy shown by the various unions.

66

30. This difficulty we believe and hope will be cleared away by means of a better understanding.

31. We have found many employers keen on our work, and they would gladly make use of the exchanges if they were placed on a comprehensive basis.

32. There has been a tendency to confuse us with distress committees, and in some cases employers have stated that under our present constitution, if they made use of the exchanges, they would be assisting to aid a

on.

35. Workpeople living in Shoreditch have been placed in Bermondsey; workpeople in Woolwich have been placed in Kensington; workpeople in Camberwell have been placed in Islington; work people in Lewisham have been placed in Hammersmith; and so We can enumerate many instances in which men and women have been placed from one extremity of London to another more quickly than by means of advertisement, and without the waste of time and energy incurred in tramping from one point of London to another looking for work.

36. The present system of employment in vogue, whether in engaging men through advertisement or Advantage taking them on at the gate, shows an utter lack of organi- of labour sation, and is unsatisfactory both to employers and exchanges over present employés. In districts where men are wanted for daily system of work it is customary for men to wait at the various engaging firms where they may have a chance of work. We find workmen. groups of men at a dozen different gates. By using the exchange as a centre, the employer could rely upon having just the men required, and the men could know in a moment exactly where they would be wanted.

37. The exchange, by organising labour, would replace the present chaotic state of affairs by a comprehensive system based on industrial demand and supply.

bureaux.

38. In conclusion, we would point out that all private efforts in the direction of labour bureaux have failed. Failure of Private employment agencies can only be sectional and private local in their efforts, however ably administered. They labour can only deal with applicants who have means, and further, only get in touch with a limited number of employers, the situations found bearing a small relation to the number of applications received, or fees collected., 39. I append copy of an estimate prepared by the association of the annual expenditure which it is believed [Appendices.] would be necessary to maintain a system of employment exchanges operating over the whole of London, Greater London, and with special officers working the business centres in the counties adjacent to London (Appendix No. XCI (A).)

40. I also append copy of a statement as to labour exchanges in Germany, which was received by the association from the secretary of the Metal Workers' Federation at Stuttgart (Appendix No. XCI (B) .)

STATEMENT AS TO DISTRESS DUE TO UNEMPLOYMENT.

41. The greater number of unemployed in Lewisham Unemploybelong to the building or transport trades; there has been ment in a considerable amount of work in those trades until two Lewisham. years ago, when a serious depression set in. The absence of all machinery to transfer the men affected to districts where a greater demand for labour exists caused great stagnation; the pressure in Lewisham is easing as the men gradually find outlets.

42. The effects of frequent terms of unemployment are Effects of bad on the individuals affected; they lose heart and, unemploy unless in possession of indomitable spirits, sink into ment. indifference, frequently becoming members of the socalled "wastrel class.

43. All special work provided by municipalities should Municipal only deal with trades in which seasonal depression exists, relief work. thus enabling a stricter discipline to be maintained; public works where men of all occupations are employed Results of must be costly, as the slowest men set the pace.

relief work under Ur

44. Relief works provided by the Central (Unemployed) employed Body for London have suffered from the same cause as Workmen given above.

Act.

that if they were starting a new exchange in a district, they Mr. Edward would send an officer or officers to work that district. James Fair. First of all, these officers would approach the town clerk

If an employer sends to me for a man, whatever he wants, say a carpenter, for instance, I simply select the most suitable carpenter on my books and send him to that employer.

81497. Are there certain rules which are applicable to Rules governing these exchanges ?—We have working rules which are not metropolitan very stringent. We have a good deal of latitude. exchanges.

Composition of advisory committee

81498. Are those rules made by the central body?— Those are framed by the central body.

81499. Have you a copy that we may put in ?—I have not a copy, but I will send you copy. (See Appendix to Messrs. Jackson & Pringle's Report, p. 383).

81500. Have you at Lewisham an advisory committee ? -Yes, I have an advisory committee.

81501. How is that composed ?-The Lewisham Borat Lewisham. ough Council nominated five members, or rather elected them, I should say, and the Chairman (who was one of the local members on the central body) and myself were asked by the central body to select a list of likely employers and likely trade representatives, which was sent up to the central body, and the bulk of those were appointed on my committee. I have about thirteen members now.

Practice of Lewisham exchange as to live and dead

registers.

Attitude of

trade unions

81502. So your committee represents the workmen, the employers and the local authority?—Yes, exactly.

81503. But the actual selection, except in the case of the representatives of the local authority, was made by the central body ?-Yes, that is it.

81504. Supposing a man on your register gets employment apart from you, does he notify that to you ?-In some cases. As a rule, of course, they simply lapse. We register a man and his name is on the books for seven days; he then has to come at the end of the seven days to renew his application. If he does not do that, we simply pass him to the dead drawer. If he notifies us, as they do in some cases, that he has found employment, we make a note of that. As a rule, he is simply passed to the dead drawer on failing to renew his application, and we conclude that he has found employment.

81505. But the fact of your renewing them every seven days prevents your keeping on the books what may be called dead cases ?-Yes; you are still on a live register.

81506. With regard to the trade unions in your district, what is the relation between you and them ?—The relation at first was, well, very peculiar. They looked upon the in Lewisham. exchange as a blackleg organisation, and in fact, a good deal of nonsense was talked about it, but I managed to get in touch with the local secretaries and arranged for them to allow me to address their branches. In company with my friend here, Mr. Hunt, and another of our superintendents, Mr. Bogan, who takes a good deal of interest in the question, we have addressed these branches, and we have had quiet discussions-sometimes not so quiet as at other times-and we have fought the whole question out. Now they quite realise that the exchange will not injure

Staff at Lewisham exchange.

them in any way, and the feeling in Lewisham is certainly friendly. My advisory committee are arranging a conference on Friday week between the branches in order to finally fetch in those that are outstanding at the present

moment.

81507. You have told us what your staff and organisation are; practically you have got two clerks, I understand?-That is so now. I have only had the second one about two months-that is all.

81508. They are appointed by the central body, are they not?-Yes.

81509. Do you get any voluntary assistance at all, or do you depend entirely on your own staff ?-Entirely on my own staff.

Difficulties in 81510. You say in Paragraph 10: "The superintendents way of the have had to struggle against many difficulties in trying metropolitan to deal with the industrial needs of the largest city in the exchanges. world; would you explain that a little, and say what is the nature of the difficulties you have in your mind? -Yes. The central body, in starting these exchanges -of course one can hardly blame them, because no one had had any previous experience in the matter-hardly looked upon it as a new business, and they did not put first the organising work in the district which ought to have preceded the creation of an exchange. I take it now

and from him they would go to the mayor of the borough 29 Oct., 1907. and to the councillors, and then to the principal employers, then they would get into touch with trade associations Difficulties in and trade councils and all the rest, so as to familiarise them way of the with the idea that they were about to open an exchange. metropolitan exchanges. At present when a superintendent starts in a district, no one has heard anything of what he is going to do, or what the exchange is, or anything else. Not one man in twenty knows what an employment exchange is or what it means, and that has made the work exceedingly difficult. It has happened when you go to canvass employers of labour that you have had to explain the principle on which the exchanges are worked. Even a short time ago, in my borough council, one councillor got up and said he objected to the exchange because it cost 30s. to find a man 5s. worth of work. It costs nothing of the sort; but this condition of things leads to much confusion on the point.

81511. I think there is another difficulty, namely, that the existence of the exchange is not always known in the locality?—Yes, decidedly so.

vertising the

81512. How do you get over that difficulty? You have told us that you send circulars to the employers ?We are gradually trying to advertise the exchange as much as we can. I have been putting in a good deal of work in my spare time addressing trade associations -any society, or guild, or what not, where we have a Need of adchance of getting known. But certainly the best method would be to advertise us. Even as far as Lewisham is exchanges. concerned, if we were advertised on the London County Council tram cars it would be a big step forward; if they would only advertise our exchanges on the sides of their cars in the same way as they advertised their steam boats this summer it would be a big help. I have a scheme which I have just lately introduced. I have boards outside the local libraries on which the caretaker every morning at seven posts up a list of the situations I have vacant. That tends to attract men to the exchange, and also to bring home to those employers who see the boards that we are really doing business.

81513. Does not the fact that you have succeeded in getting a good many situations for the men advertise the exchange?—It does up to a certain point. The difficulty has been this, that we could not get enough situations at the commencement. Going back to my returns this time last year, I find I was then having about seven or eight situations in the week, which was not enough to keep the decent class of men around us. Then when we gradually became known, the employers came to us, and the difficulty arose that we could not get men. If we had been able to fill up at first every situation that we got offered, as we would have done if we had got a fair support, and if we had had a number of canvassers to go round and give the thing a start, we should have been all right. You know the business method;

immediately the gas company or the electric light company or the National Telephone Company open a new exchange, or anything of the sort, they put canvassers We have nothing of that sort, although the labour exchange is purely a commercial undertaking and nothing else.

on.

81514. Has there been any alteration in the character Better class -I do not mean morally, but I mean in their status and of applicants general position-of these men since you first started? to exchanges.. Decidedly so.

81515. Are they better or worse?-They are much better. The indifferent class simply go to the distress committee; in fact, we advise them to go there-we tell them frankly we can do nothing for them and they must go to the distress committee.

81516. And they do not renew their application to be put on the register?-No. We simply try to keep the best of them around us, and to transfer all the indifferent ones to the distress committee.

81517. What about the women; have you any women Need of separate upon your register ?-Yes, we register women. department 81518. You yourself would have to deal with them, for women at as you have no female officer ?-That is so. exchanges.

Mr. Edward 81519. One of your recommendations is that there James Fair. should be some arrangement of that kind?-Certainly

So. It is very unpleasant at the present moment if you 29 Oct., 1907. have to fetch a respectable girl down to the exchange at nine o'clock in the morning, which it is sometimes necessary to do in order to bring her to the employer, and there are a dozen or twenty navvies—I am not referring to the navvies unkindly-rough types of men, there. That is objectionable to a decent girl.

Desirability

81520. Have you more than one room in which you see them ?-We have only the one room.

81521. So that you cannot see the women in a separate room ?—No, we cannot see them separately.

81522. You say, I think, somewhere in your Statement, of dissociat- that you would recommend that the labour exchange ing labour should be dissociated from the distress committee ?Yes, entirely so.

exchange

from Distress Committee. Proper

govern labour exchanges.

81523. Would you mind explaining a little more fully why you think that desirable ?-My own idea is that authority to labour exchanges should be placed under a Government department, preferably the Board of Trade, working conjointly with the county councils. I think we should work a lot better with the county councils than we would with the borough councils-a great deal better. It would be an advantage if you could work out a scheme by which the Board of Trade got a centralised control, so that they could keep all the exchanges up to a certain standard. Supposing one county council was sympathetic and another one was apathetic, then, unless you have got some centralised authority controlling the lot, you would get one exchange properly managed, and another mismanaged. So you do want some central authority, and, at the same time, you want to work with the county councils in order to get the local interest.

Importance of linked up system of exchanges over whole country.

81524. In London, the County Council have rather a large area to look after, have they not?-Quite right. 81525. Therefore, would you say in London it would be desirable to bring in the County Council ?-Yes, rather -decidedly, I should say.

81526. It would mean a system of Government management, would it not ?-Quite right. My own idea is that the Government should be responsible for the staff, and the staff responsible to the Government, while the local management of the exchange, the cost of offices and fittings, and all that sort of thing, should be found by the County Council.

81527. Do you attach importance to linking up all these institutions all over the country ?-Yes, decidedly.

81528. Do you think at the present time there is a want of knowledge that there is labour at one place and that there is room for the employment of that labour at another ?—There is undoubtedly.

81529. That has come under your own knowledge? -Yes.

81530. Is there a difficulty in this way: Supposing it was known that there was work to be had in a particular place, are the circumstances of the place known; for instance, whether there is housing accommodation there? -Of course, we do not know that at present, but with exchanges working all over the country you would know the exact local conditions. At the present moment, for instance, I have sent some men to the Grimsby dock extension, but then I do not know what the local conditions are there. If we had an exchange at Grimsby, one would know exactly.

81531. I suppose the small numbers you have had to deal with in any particular place, have not made that question of housing important ?—No.

81532. You say that London should, for these purposes, be treated as a larger unit than the present county of London ?-Decidedly so.

81533. That is, I suppose, in order to bring in the working-class areas outside London, such as Edmonton, West Ham, and similar places; is that what you have in mind ?-Yes, and right away into the heart of the adjacent counties all round London, because the building trade is extending and there is not much building in the heart of London. Take my own case; if I go down to Orpington and the other side of Bromley, the building trade is busy at the present moment, but it is frightfully slack in Lewisham and there is practically nothing doing

there at all. But, as I say, when I get out towards Orpington and Bromley, the building trade is working there, and if we were working Bromley we should have a chance of placing our men.

81534. Supposing you had a national system of exchanges all over the country, it would not much matter then what the local area was, would it ?-No; that would be a matter of indifference.

81535. Except that the area should be of a convenient size? Certainly.

81536. Can you give us at all what your exchange Cost of does actually cost at the present moment ?-No; but Lewisham I should think as near as I can get at it that it would exchange. be about £350 a year.

81537. The second part of the statement which you have handed in deals with distress due to unemployment, and those Paragraphs 41 to 50, I understand represent your own personal views ?-Yes, those are my own personal views.

81538. With regard to those, you are not purporting to represent your association ?—No.

81539. I see you have some views with regard to the special work provided by municipalities ?—Yes, I have, decidedly.

81540. What do you say about that ?-I think that Municipal in the case of a municipality or of a borough council relief work. creating any special work it should only apply to the building and labouring trades; and it can only, to my mind, help those trades. I think that if we imitate somewhat the lines which I believe some of the German towns have adopted, that is to say, reserve all the new street work and improvements for the winter time and do it then-I believe that as a rule they do it by contract-that would help to relieve the distress when it is acutest in the building trade. To send an unemployed printer or engineer or boilermaker to build a new street is simply foolishness.

81541. Have you had personal experience with regard to that?-Yes, I have.

81542. Would you mind telling us what it was ?—I was making a new street for the Lewisham Borough Council before I took up the labour bureau work. I had men sent from the stone-yard, and any amount of them were simply useless for that work; they might be quite willing to do it if they could, but they could not do it.

81543. Did you find that they were fairly willing to work as far as they were able to do so ?-Some of them were, certainly.

81544. But you thought the work unsatisfactory, because they were incapable of doing that which you set them to do ?—Yes, quite right.

81545. And consequently, I suppose, it was expensive? -Very expensive indeed.

labour

81546. Then with regard to farm colonies, have you Faults of had any experience in respect to them ?-Only as clerk present to the Lewisham Distress Committee. Of course I have system of had to send men to Hollesley Bay and to Fambridge. colonies. Hollesley Bay is the only farm colony really. It always struck me that to send a man to a colony merely for sixteen weeks was a waste of money. It might pull him round, it might restore his health, or anything of that sort; but merely as finding him a job there was nothing in it. It would be much cheaper to find him a local job. If he was a man that you could train for agricultural life or that you could train for emigration, or what not, then to send him to a colony for a fair period would be another matter altogether.

81547. That is to say, if you were to look upon a farm colony as a place of training, you would want a longer stay than sixteen weeks ?-Certainly.

81548. At the same time, it did, did it not, find occupation for a man during the time of temporary distress? -Yes, merely as finding him a job, certainly; but I know there was a lot of objection from the social point of view to men being away from home for a month at a stretch-there was a great objection to that.

81549. Did that work badly within your knowledge ?— Yes, it did. There were lots of complaints about it as far as Lewisham was concerned.

81550. I see you think that afforestation, and such like work, would be the best thing on which to put the unemployed?—I do.

81551. But would there not be this difficulty, that afforestation can only be done at certain times of the year?--You can, of course, do it in the height of summer, but it would not be very profitable to do so. As a rule, you can do it for about eight months in the year, if you include preparing the ground. Planting the trees is, of course, another matter.

81552. You could not do it in a very severe winter, when the ground was covered with snow ?-You could not do it then, certainly not.

81553. That is the sort of time, is it not, when the unemployed chiefly want employment ?-Yes; but then, I think, if you organise your local work, that would deal with the class who are affected and who are, to use a wellknown term, frozen out. Is is the building trade chiefly that is affected by the frost and snow, and all that sort of thing.

81554. (Mr. Lansbury.) You agree, I suppose, that labour exchanges do not really create work ?—No, they will not create work, but I think they will tend to extend it, to a certain degree. I believe all improved organisation does that.

81555. To make more work ?-Not exactly to make more work, but by reducing the period which elapses before a man gets employment now, I think it will tend to improve matters. I look upon it in this way: take a screw-cutting machine, and say you get one that produces so many screws per hour, and then you get an improved machine which produces a great many more, I do not think that creates work. So I am not going to say an employment exchange is going actually to create work, but I think an improved organisation will tend to find it.

81556. We are in a very bad period just now; there is nothing to prevent you, or to prevent labour exchanges in London, finding employment for all the men, if there were jobs for them in the country, say ?-There is not in London, of course.

81557. I am putting it in the country. You could write to Manchester, Liverpool, Leeds, Bradford, all these various cities, for there is nothing to prevent you communicating with the town clerk ?-You could not do it like that; you could not possibly do it.

81558. You are aware, are you not, that the Local Government Board did communicate with all the local authorities a few years back ?—Yes.

81559. Three years ago, I think it was ?—Yes. 81560. Did you see the return that came up of the places where men were wanted ?-No, I did not.

81561. I think you might get that; it might help you in making up your mind as to what a labour exchange will do in the way of finding work. The assumption, I take it, is that there are jobs somewhere, but men and women do not know where they are ?-They ultimately find them, but an exchange properly worked will find them quicker?

81562. It may be my density, but I cannot understand how that in any way adds to the volume of labour for a period; I do not quite see it. Take the Orpington I understand that at Orpington just building trade; now the building trade, you say, is busy ?-It is fairly so. 81563. If you were at Bromley, you could supply the men ?-Yes.

81564. Are there any men in Bromley to supply the needs there, or are the builders at Orpington not able to get their men ?-They ultimately get them, but they have a difficulty.

81565. Are they able to get them to-day-I do not mean ultimately, I mean now ?—There is a difficulty in getting them.

81566. If you would not mind letting me have the addresses of them, I should be obliged, because we have got plenty of men we could send. You ought to be able to fill them up quite easily?—I have not the time to get in touch with the builders.

How far labour ex

81568. They would go down there certainly and get changes can the work? They would get a lot of applicants for the remedy unemployment. work who would not be of the type they want.

81569. The point is, are they really wanting men? I am interested in this, because I can send them some ?— I cannot say definitely. I have got in touch with these men to a certain extent, and there certainly does seem to be a demand for men there which there is not in Lewisham at the present time.

81570. That does not mean that the demand is not being met that is my only point ?-Certainly not; and I do not wish to say that at the moment, but I do say that an exchange working in Bromley would fill those situations quicker than they are filled now.

81571. And probably increase the amount of building that is going to be done there ?—No, I do not think so. 81572. Then the volume of work would not be increased? If you put it like that, no.

81573. Then about saving work up for the winter- Question of time; do you mean the making of a new road, or the postponing re-making of a road, and that kind of thing ?-Certainly. road-work etc., till 81574. You think that ought to be saved up for the winter winter ?—Yes, I think so, and I have always thought so. months. 81575. Of course, there is the point Sir Samuel Provis put to you, that in the wintertime the roads freeze; that is certainly the worse time to do this work, is it not ?— Certainly it is, and the most expensive.

81576. Then the argument about afforestation being unsuitable in winter really holds good in reference to your reserve work too ?-Of course, if frost and snow come in, it stops all outside employment.

81577. That is the point I am trying to make, that when you get to that point, there is hardly any outside work that can be done at all ?-Probably none at all.

81578. Then as to the separation of a man from his Labour wife and children at the labour colony; did you hear colonies: any complaints in Lewisham, and if so, what was the suggestel nature of the complaints ?-It is difficult, in a mixed objection audience like this, to say exactly, but there were a gool deal of complaints from a social point of view.

from social point of view of separating 81579. Lewisham must have been rather peculiar. husband and wife. Could you let us know the number of cases in which the women went wrong-that is what you mean, I supposebecause of the absence of the husbands ?-I do not think I could definitely state a case, but there was a good deal of suspicion abroad, and I think that is almost as bad.

81580. Is it not rather unfair to put it in the way you have that there were a good many complaints ?— There were complaints, you know, and there was a lot of suspicion.

81581. I want to know in how many cases that suspicion fixed itself; because it is a serious thing?—There were two cases at least in which I do not think there could be much doubt.

81582. But it was never finally proved ?-No. In one case the husband objected to proving it.

81583. Objected to what ?-He did not want to prove it. He made the complaint at first, and then he let the matter slide; he did not like to prove it. That was a case in which he accused one of the inquiry officers of misconduct, and I am afraid from the inquiries we made, there was little doubt but that it was true.

me.

81584. There are two cases that you have in your mind, are there?—Yes. I do not want you to misunderstand I am not saying that it is bad, but there was a could, to send the wife and children as well to the colony, complaint, and I think it would be far better, if you and to give the man a long period of training rather than just this sixteen weeks. That is all that I want to bring out. I do not know that there was anything radically wrong in it, but there are objections from the social point of view, and also, I think, it is wrong in every way to separate a man from his wife if you can possibly avoid it.