If we enquire as to the reasons for this apathy among women-workers, a great many can be given. One is the danger of victimisation, which may fall very hardly on collectors and Committee members. Another is the fatigue of the long day in the mill, the natural desire for a little amus.e.m.e.nt, or the amount of house-work to be done. Lancashire women are "house-proud" to an extraordinary degree, and cannot be satisfied without a high standard of comfort in such matters as cleanliness, food, and furniture. All this means work, and though the high wages current in the cotton towns might seem to make it possible to pay for household help, such help is not very easy to come by. Domestic service has. .h.i.therto been demanded only by a limited cla.s.s in the community, because very few outside that cla.s.s could afford to pay for it. A highly paid industry like the cotton trade makes servants scarce, and anything like a general demand for domestic help on a broad democratic scale could not possibly be satisfied as things are now. Even help in washing is not easily had. So the Lancashire woman or girl contrives to work her ten hours in the mill, and come back to a second day"s work in the evening, with such a.s.sistance as may be given by the older members of the family. Lancashire is really suffering from the service question in an acute form, so acute that it is taken for granted it cannot be answered. A surprising part of the matter is that a cla.s.s of women so intelligent, so industrious, and comparatively so well-paid, should not ere this have made a concerted demand for better labour-saving devices in their houses.

But after all the domestic difficulty does not explain the whole problem of woman"s apathy and indifference in Trade Unions. Supposing the meeting occurs only once a quarter, as in some places, house-work cannot be an insuperable obstacle to attendance at such rare intervals. One weaver told me she had been "bread-winner, nurse, and cleaner" at home, and yet had found time to attend meetings. Probably the real explanation of the att.i.tude of women generally towards the Union is to be found in their education and outlook. Lloyd Jones, in his life of Robert Owen, explained the failure of the early co-operative societies by the fact that at that time the working-cla.s.s had no habit of a.s.sociation. The old forms had gone; the new had been legally suppressed. Under the changed conditions of modern life the working-cla.s.s has had to evolve a new set of social habits and a new code of social duty. The habit of a.s.sociation has developed more slowly among women than among men, because to some extent it does undeniably come in conflict with the traditional moralities of women. To a great many women the idea of home duty means duty within the home; they are only beginning to find out by slow degrees that their home is largely dependent for its very existence on outside impersonal forces about which it is inc.u.mbent on the home-maker to know something, even if she has to go outside to get knowledge. The Weavers" Secretary, even in Lancashire, still finds that "females are a deal more arduous to organise than males"; he supposes, because "they"ve been brought up to be different." They cost more in collecting expenses, and the propensity of girls to get married, to leave work or change their occupation is a constant source of anxiety.

"They are always on the move," and perpetual watchfulness is needed to enrol the young ones as they enter the mill. Tact and diplomacy are expended in inducing the women-workers to keep an eye on the younger members, to bring them in as early in their industrial careers as possible. Even such homely arguments as "it saves your money from stamps,"

are not disdained in the effort to persuade the women to use their own personal influence to keep the flame alive. Small commissions are given to a member of a Union who brings in a new member. But without commissions women do a good deal of recruiting in the mills. The Lancashire cotton Unions do not run themselves; their efficiency is very largely the result of constant watchfulness and patient effort on the part of the officials, backed up by the pluck, tenacity, and high standard of comfort of the Lancashire woman herself.

A strong feeling, however, is now arising that there is a need for organisation of women within the Union, to induce them to come out more, to take more pains to understand the civic machinery of life which so largely controls their work, their livelihood, and the possibilities of health and strength both for themselves and their children. There is always a splendid remnant in Lancashire who feel themselves to be citizens; but a more general movement seems now to be beginning. This movement is partly due to economic changes in the distribution of the industry. Some mills nowadays employ scarcely any men. Such are mills or sheds for ring-winding, cop-winding, reeling and beaming, occupations exclusively appropriated to women. In such mills there will be a man employed as overlooker, and a mechanic to repair or look after the machines, and there is or should be a man or strong lad to carry the "skips," But the industry itself is here carried on by women, and in such cases women often develop powers. .h.i.therto latent for undertaking the Committee work and management of the Union. The same thing happens in districts where the demand for male labour in other occupations is sufficiently urgent to draw men away from weaving altogether.

At Wigan the Committee is wholly staffed by women. At Stockport all but the president, secretary, and one member are women. At Oldham about half the Committee are women. In the largest centres of the industry things are moving more slowly. In one very large and important Union the first woman representative has recently been elected to the Committee. At Blackburn two places on the Committee are now appropriated to the winders and warpers, who are all women; this has the effect of reserving two places exclusively for women. Here also the practice obtains of appointing a worker in each mill as a representative of the Union, to keep the secretary in touch with what is going on, and about twenty women, chosen chiefly from the winders, now fill the post of mill representative. The Insurance Act also has had the indirect effect of bringing in a certain number of women as sick visitors or pay stewards. Women are thus gradually being drawn forward, with results that indicate that custom is to blame for their previous isolation, rather than any inherent incapacity or unwillingness on their part.

There is a good deal that men might do to meet the women half-way. The secretary may regretfully remark that the women members make no use of the handsome inst.i.tute and comfortable rooms that are at the disposal of all members of a Union, but the women complain privately that there is no room appropriated to their use. This is felt as a difficulty by women, while it is unnoticed and unconsidered by men. However heartily one may agree that men and women would be better for the opportunities of social intercourse such as an inst.i.tute provides, however much one may wish to see women making use of its amenities yet, as a beginning, perhaps always, it would obviously be advisable to set apart for them a sitting-room of their own.

Women would like to go in to look at the papers and so on, but are deterred by the idea that they are not expected, or not wanted, or that their appearance may cause surprise in the minds of their male colleagues.

"They did stare a bit, but they weren"t a bit disagreeable," one woman weaver remarked after having valiantly entered her own inst.i.tute and read her own magazines. Pioneers may do these doughty deeds; the average young woman, even in Lancashire, is singularly shy in some ways, however much the reverse she may appear in others. There is no doubt that social life in England suffers from the unwholesome segregation of women from the affairs of the community. They are too much cut off from the interests of men, most of which ought rather to be the interests of human beings. The beginnings of better things are now being made, but comradeship and consideration on both sides are needed.

A movement for shorter hours is going on in the Cotton Operatives" Unions, and has been sympathetically regarded for many years by the Women Factory Inspectors, who realise the intensity of the work in cotton factories as few outsiders can do. The actual operations of joining threads, removing cops, replacing shuttles and so forth are not in themselves very laborious. The strain occurs in the long hours the women are at work, most of them having to stand all the time, and the close attention that has to be given. Every broken thread means _pro tanto_ a stoppage of wages, and eyes and fingers have to be constantly on the alert to see and do instantly what is necessary. All this time, in most cases, the women are on their feet; all this time, in many cases, breathing an unnaturally heated air, sickened by the disagreeable smell of the oil and size, the ceaseless din of machinery in their ears, dust and fluff continually ready to invade the system. In recent years the increased speed has enormously increased the strain of work. It would seem that here is a clear case for shorter hours by law, but strange to say in practice some women are found to be rather nervous about such a measure. I know one highly intelligent girl who fears that shorter hours may mean increased speed, and thinks that that would be "more than flesh and blood could bear." Others fear a loss in earnings. These fears, however, are not shared by all, and after considerable discussion with different persons, I incline to hope that they are not justified. It is, of course, true that in the cotton trade conditions are very different from those in certain trades where shorter hours have resulted in an actual increase of output. The machinery is of enormous value, and is already speeded up to such an extent that no great increase of output on the present machines seems possible or thinkable. On the other hand, there might quite possibly be a very much smaller deficit on shorter hours than the uninitiated would expect. One result would probably be a greater regularity of output through the day. Girls will own that they literally cannot keep going all the time, that they are forced to relax at intervals, and they add; "if we had shorter hours we should be able to work right through." There are masters who think the early morning hours" work is hardly worth the trouble. The Trade Union secretaries with many years" knowledge and experience of the working of the Factory Acts behind them, do not fear any permanent reduction of wages. A forty-eight hours" week, or an eight hours" day would quite likely result in diminished earnings for the first few weeks or months. But given time to work itself out, it would regularise production and tend to smooth out alternatives of "glut" and slack time. A second probable result would be some increase in piece rates, and the workers would in no wise be worse off. No doubt this change will meet with considerable resistance, but judging by past history, it will probably not cause any permanent injury to the interests of either labour or capital.

_Winders._--Winding is the process of running the yarn off the spinner"s cop on to a "winder"s bobbin." There are two processes, "cop-winding" and "ring-winding," the latter being a comparatively new process. The winders, though included usually in the same unions with weavers, are far less strongly organised. Neither process has as yet a uniform list, but the cop-winders have lists which cover large areas. The ring-winders are still less protected, and as a result they are underpaid.

Increasing discontent among the winders at Blackburn lately caused a demand for direct representation on the Committee. The position is curious, there being a woman winder and a warper now serving on the Committee while the weavers, a larger and better paid body of women, are represented only by men. Winding is said to be harder and worse paid than weaving, and "driving" has been introduced in recent years. "If there is one operative who earns the money she receives it is the winder."[27]

Nevertheless, there are some women who cannot stand the strain of weaving, and take to winding. Further enquiry into this apparent inconsistency elicited the fact that winding, although hard and monotonous work with its continual removing cops and joining threads, is in some ways a less continuous, unremitting strain than weaving.[28] Winders do not often work on Sat.u.r.day morning, and they may occasionally have short intervals of rest. They also have the chance of promotion to be a warper, a post which admits of much more sitting down than either of the other two, and is consequently coveted.

The defective organisation of the winders appears to be due to the absence of men among the ranks. The close community of interests which produced the exceptional success of the Weavers" Union has been lacking, and the winders appear to have been overlooked. Faults in quality or mistakes made in the spinning-room are often credited to the winder, beamer or reeler.

It is, however, constantly pointed out in the reports of the Amalgamation that they have the remedy in their own hands, and should organise more strongly to get the advantages enjoyed by the weavers. The recent awakening at Blackburn, indicated above, is a most hopeful sign. At Stockport also, the secretary is making a special effort to organise the winders, and at Padiham it has recently been proposed to give them special representation on the Committee as at Blackburn.

_Card-room Operatives._--Unions of card- and blowing-room operatives began to accept women members about 1870, or a little later. Women are now organised in the same Union with men, and form about 90 per cent of the workers. The work forms part of the process of preparing cotton for spinning, and is heavy and dangerous in character. The conditions under which, and the purposes for which, benefit is granted resemble those of the weavers" Unions. The organisation of card-room operatives was greatly improved from 1885 to 1890 or 1894, and may be now considered to have reached a condition of comparative permanence and stability. The usual complaint is, however, made that women are apathetic and take little interest in Union affairs. This state of things is keenly regretted by the secretary, who would gladly see women members on the Committee. The difficulties in effective organisation of industries with so large a proportion of young and irresponsible workers are seen in a recent report of a card-room operatives" society. "Ring-room doffers are about the most difficult cla.s.s we have to deal with in the matter of keeping them organised, and we can only a.s.sume, as most of them are young persons, that it is mostly their parents who are to blame for this apparent carelessness. So we appeal to the parents of this cla.s.s of operative to take a keener interest in the welfare of those for whom they are responsible, and would remind them that the writer of this article well remembers the time when this cla.s.s of operative was looked upon as well paid at 5s. 2d. per week, while at the present time the lowest wage paid to our knowledge is 9s. 3d., an advance of 4s. 1d. per week. Surely the few coppers required could easily be spared from this advance, and the benefits returnable are as good an investment as it is possible to find."

Card-room operatives have usually been regarded as socially somewhat inferior to the weavers, the work being more arduous and done in more dangerous conditions and the women usually of a rougher cla.s.s. It seems, however, probable that this condition is changing. Card-room work is becoming more popular as comparatively good wages come at an earlier age than in weaving. It is impossible to exaggerate the importance of effective organisation to this cla.s.s of workers. In its absence the large proportion of women can be taken advantage of to lower conditions of work all round. Closer co-operation with Unions of other cla.s.ses of workers might be very useful, especially on the question of speeding up. The card-room operatives are speeded and "rushed," working under high pressure, and at the same time the winder, beamer and warper complain of bad cotton, and the weaver strikes on account of the same grievance.

Surely the remedy is obvious.

Ring-spinners are often included in the same Union with card-room operatives, and quite recently a special effort has been made to improve the organisation of ring-room workers. A "universal list" was obtained in 1912.[29]

_Other Workers._--Outside the cotton operatives there are a comparatively small number of women organised with men in Unions of varying strength and effectiveness. As regards linen and jute there is a Union at Dundee which includes over 5000 women, but appears to have made little progress in numbers in quite recent years. The secretary states that the majority of women in the jute trade have very little conception of what Trade Unionism really means, but that the same applies also to many of the men. He considers that the women"s outlook has become broadened within recent years. There are some women now serving on the Committee, and the women generally are reported to take a "fair amount of interest" in the work of the society. The other Unions belonging to this industry are scattered over Ireland and Scotland.

Wool and worsted is backward in organisation, both for men and women. The Union at Huddersfield includes 4000 women, but a correspondent writes that the General Union, which has branches in all the important textile centres of the West Riding, in actual strength is scarcely one in ten of its possible membership. The apathy of the women, in the Huddersfield district at all events, cannot be due to poverty, for the subscriptions are low while the women"s average wage is high. Nor is it due to the temporary nature of women"s work, for in this district many continue work after marriage. The Yorkshire women are said by one correspondent to take little interest in public affairs in any way; by another, "not as much as they should, but more than they used to do. It"s a big work organising and keeping women in. Marriage, flightiness, lack of vision, lack of help and encouragement from fathers and brothers all tend to make it hard. The lower the wages, the harder the task of making them into Unionists." The difficulty of organising them is great, and outside Huddersfield they are extremely badly paid--so badly, indeed, that in our correspondent"s opinion the trade needs to be scheduled under the Trade Boards Act. At Bradford considerable efforts have been made from time to time to get the women into the Union, but these have failed; and even during the last boom, due to the flourishing state of trade and to the Insurance Act, very little progress has been made.

The Clothing Unions are making rapid progress, including nearly 10,000 women in 1912, and the Trade Boards will a.s.sist the movement. In Leeds there has been some natural indignation at the low minimum fixed, which has impelled to organisation. The Unions follow the Lancashire pattern in organising women along with men. The standard rate for women in the Amalgamated Society of Clothiers operatives at Leeds is 4d. an hour, which is held to be achieved if the piece rates yield as much to 70 per cent of any section or grade of work. In the Boot and Shoe Unions a considerable percentage increase was registered for 1910 to 1912, and the numbers reached 8720 in the latter year.

Printing offers some of the most difficult problems connected with the organisation of women.[30] Men in these trades have undeniably offered serious obstacles to the inclusion of women. In 1886 a Conference of Typographical Societies of the United Kingdom and of the Continent, held in London, being "of the opinion that women are not physically capable of performing the duties of a compositor," resolved to recommend their admission to societies upon the same conditions as journeymen, to be paid strictly the same rate. This resolution was adopted by the London Society of Compositors, and it became practically impossible for a woman to join the society, as women could not keep up to the standard and efficiency of men. One woman joined in 1892, but subsequently left. The women were practically excluded from the Compositors" Union by the fixing of equal rates of pay. This was not so much discrimination against women because they were women, as a demonstration against the black-leg compet.i.tion of the unskilled against the skilled. It is stated that women compositors are regarded as so inferior to men that only among employers in a small way of business, working with small capital, where low wages const.i.tute an advantage sufficient to counter-poise the lack of technical skill, can they find employment. In 1894 a militant Union of women was organised, and struck for increased wages and improved conditions, the women going out to show their sympathy with the men, who had been locked out. In recognition of the women"s sympathy the men gave some help and support to this Union, which, however, after increasing to 350 began to decline. It was subsequently recognised as a branch of the Printers, Stationers, and Warehous.e.m.e.n.

In the cigar trade, as in printing, it has to be owned that women came in "not for doing more, but for asking less." Their labour was at first employed chiefly for the less skilled branches, a small number only being employed in skilled work; but in both divisions they worked for a lower rate than men. It was not until 1887 that a Union for women was established. They still, unfortunately, continued to undersell men, until at last the men, who at first were hostile to their female compet.i.tors, saw that it was hopeless to try and keep them out, and that for their own sakes amalgamation was the wiser course. The adjustment of the wage-scale was a problem of some delicacy. To raise the scale of women"s wages to the same as men"s would probably have meant driving the women from the trade; to leave them on the lower scale would mean that women would contrive to undersell men. It was finally decided to take the highest existing rates of pay for women as the basis of the women"s Union rates. After the Amalgamation had been achieved, women"s wages rose 25 per cent, and the recognised policy of the Union was to make advantageous terms with each employer opening a new factory. Women are not, on the whole, such valuable workers as are men; they are slower, and often do not remain very long in the trade.[31] Lower rates of pay, as long as they are not permitted to fall indefinitely, are a distinct advantage to women in getting and keeping employment. The numbers in Unions in food and tobacco were only 2000 in 1910, and have since fallen slightly.

There are also a good many small Unions of women only, some of which are affiliated to the Women"s Trade Union League. The numbers of women organised in the trades especially their own, such as dressmaking, the needle trades, and domestic work, are disappointingly small. It has to be remembered, however, that such occupations as these are still for the most part carried on either in the employers" or the workers" homes. The factory system has begun to make some way in dressmaking, but not to a considerable extent. It is not surprising that the workers in these industries are behind the factory workers in learning the lesson of combination for mutual help and protection.

Unions in the lower grade industries, which till lately have been unorganised, will be treated in a later section.

_The Women"s Trade Union League._--The Society now known as the Women"s Trade Union League was founded mainly by the efforts of a remarkable woman named Emma Smith, afterwards Mrs. Paterson (1848-1886). She was the daughter of a schoolmaster and became the wife of a cabinet-maker. Her life from the age of eighteen was devoted to endeavours on behalf of the working cla.s.s and especially of women. Being a woman of natural ability and remarkable concentration of purpose, she succeeded in starting pioneer work of a difficult and unusual kind. She was secretary for five years to the Workmen"s Club and Inst.i.tute Union, and afterwards secretary to the Women"s Suffrage a.s.sociation. She was the first woman admitted to the Trade Union Congress, and attended its meetings from 1875 until 1886, with the exception only of one year, in which her husband"s last illness prevented her attendance. Although the name of the League has been altered, and its policy considerably widened and in some measure modified, it is pleasant to note that it still keeps up a continuity of tradition with Mrs. Paterson"s Protective and Provident League. Her portrait, as foundress, hangs upon the office wall, and the annual Reports are numbered continuously from the start in 1875.

Sick benefit was the main feature of the propaganda initiated by the League in its early years. The first society formed was for women employed in the printing trade. The need of a provident fund had been badly felt by these women during a trade depression three years previously, and there was no provision for the admission of women as members of the men"s societies, even if women"s wages had been (as they were not) sufficient to pay the necessary subscription to the men"s society. Mr. King, Secretary of the London Consolidated Society of Bookbinders, however, promised to support and a.s.sist the efforts to organise women in this trade. The appeal for a separate organisation of women met with a ready response. Some hundreds of women employed in folding, sewing, and other branches of the bookbinding trade, attended the first meeting, held in August 1875; a provisional committee was formed, and in October the society was formally established with a subscription of 2d. per week, and an entrance fee of 1s. Its history, however, was uneventful. It refused to join with men in making demands upon the employers, and its representatives at Trade Union Congresses and elsewhere were imbued with Mrs. Paterson"s prejudice against the Factory Act, and resisted legal restrictions upon labour.

Employers have been known to urge the formation of "a good women"s Union,"

on the ground that the fair-minded employer was detrimentally affected by the "gross inequalities of price" that existed. The backwardness and narrow views of the Women"s Union were resented by the men, and in the time of the eight hours agitation, 1891-1894, would not take part, and there was considerable ill-feeling between the two sections. This society was mainly a benefit club, and the same remark holds good of other early societies established by the Women"s Protective and Provident League, which included societies for dressmakers, hat-makers, upholsterers, and shirt- and collar-makers. The foundress, although a woman of unusual energy and initiative, whose efforts for the uplifting of women-workers should not be forgotten, was in some degree hampered by the narrow individualism characteristic of what may be designated as the Right Wing of the Women"s Rights Movement. She was an opponent of factory legislation for grown women, and did not lead the Unions under her control to attempt any concerted measures for improving the conditions of their work. The first Report of the League indicates her att.i.tude in the remarks which she reports (evidently with sympathy) from a Conference held in April 1875: "It was agreed" (viz. at this Conference) "that any further reduction of hours, if accompanied by a reduction of wages, _as it probably would be if brought about by legislation_, would be objectionable." (Italics added.) In the same Report (pp. 14-15) the writer, doubtless Mrs. Paterson herself, sums up the advantages to be obtained for women through union.

The League is to be a "centre of combined efforts" to "improve the industrial and social position of ... women"; it is "to acquire information which will enable friends of the working cla.s.ses to give a more precise direction than at present to their offers of sympathy and help. _Without interfering with the natural course of trade_, the Societies will furnish machinery for regulating the supply of labour...."

(Italics added.) "The object of the League is to promote an _entente cordiale_ between the labourer, the employer, and the consumer; and revision of the contract between the labourer and employer is only recommended in those cases in which its terms appear unreasonable and unjust to the dispa.s.sionate third party, who pays the final price for the manufactured goods and is certainly not interested in adding artificially to their cost." No direct action for raising wages is suggested.

Delegates from three Women"s Societies--shirt-makers, bookbinders, and upholsterers--were admitted to the 8th Annual Trade Union Congress, held at Glasgow, October 1875.[32] At the meeting of the T.U. Council in 1879, five women representing Unions were not only present but took an active part in the proceedings, successfully moving a resolution for additional factory inspectors, and for the appointment as such of women as well as men.

In 1877, the Amalgamated Society of Tailors having been asked by one of its branches to resist the increasing employment of women in that trade, resolved instead that the work of women should be recognised, and the women organised and properly paid. The League was asked to co-operate in forming a Union, and a Tailoresses" Union was subsequently formed. At Brighton a Union of Laundresses was formed. Various other societies were formed in these early years, many of which are now defunct.

Mrs. Paterson died in 1886, at the sadly early age of thirty-eight. During the years following, the policy of the League was enlarged and developed in a very considerable degree. Miss Clementina Black was secretary for a few years, and her second Report (1888) contains interesting remarks on the position of women: "All inquiry tends to show more and more that disorganised labour is absolutely helpless; good wages, lessened hours, better general conditions, and, on the whole, better workmanship prevail in the trades that are most completely organised. It also tends to show the injury done to men and women alike by the payment to women of unfairly low wages.... Even in employments in which the work can be done by women at least as well as by men, the wages of women are greatly inferior to those of men. And in those branches in which superior efficiency is shown by the male workers, the inferiority of the wages of the female employees is altogether out of proportion to the difference in the character of the work done by the two s.e.xes. From this cause--the payment of unfairly low wages to women simply because they are women--arises a desire on the part of grasping employers to reduce the wage-standard by engaging women in preference to men, while in many cases the conditions of female employment are onerous and oppressive to an extent which involves the greatest danger to health."

In 1889 the representation of the Society of Women Bookbinders at the Trade Union Congress, held at Dundee, moved a resolution in favour of the appointment of women factory inspectors, which was adopted. In the same year, at the International Workers" Congress, held in Paris, the representative of the London Women"s Trade Council, Miss Edith Simc.o.x, moved the following resolution, which was unanimously adopted by the representatives of all nationalities: "That the Workmen"s Party in all countries should pledge itself to promote the formation of trade organisations among the workers of both s.e.xes."

The policy of the League in regard to legislation was broadened. The protection of women through the instrumentality of the Factory Act was no longer resisted, but was recognised as a powerful force for good, to be aided in its administration and developed whenever possible. The League also indicated by the adoption of the t.i.tle "Trade Union League," and by gradually dropping the former style, "Protective and Provident," that it was inaugurating a more active policy. As a matter of tactics the League officials when appealed to for help in labour difficulties among women-workers, always endeavour _first_ to get the matter settled by negotiation; but direct action is now by no means excluded from their programme, and strikes have been called in recent years, sometimes with considerable success.

The W.T.U.L. is not a Union: it has no strike fund and pays no benefits.

It is an organisation to promote, foster, and develop the formation of Unions among women. Any Union of women, or Union in which women members are enrolled, can be affiliated to the W.T.U.L. All secretaries of affiliated London Unions are _ex-officio_ members of the League Committee, on which also are a certain number of members elected at the Annual Meeting. The W.T.U.L. also enjoys the services of an Advisory Committee of leading Trade Unionists, who are present at the Annual Meeting.

The officials of the League are a Chairman, a Secretary, two Official Organisers, and an Honorary Treasurer. The League acts as the agent of women Trade Unionists in making representations to Government authorities or Parliamentary Committees in regard to the legislation required. Abuses or grievances in particular industries are brought forward in the House of Commons by members who are in touch with the League. Complaints of breaches of the Factory and Workshop Acts can be sent to the League, and are investigated by its officials and forwarded to the proper department.

A legal advice department also forms part of the League"s functions, and deals with such matters as the a.s.sessment of compensation, disputes with Insurance Companies, deductions from wages, non-payment of wages, wrongful dismissal, claims for wages in lieu of notice, and such cases. A few instances, culled from recent Reports, will give an idea of the range and complexity of these cases.

A worker in a sweet-factory was injured by the strap of the motor falling on her head, and suffered from shock and ch.o.r.ea. The employers were foreign, and it was with special difficulty that they were got to admit that the accident had even happened. Being threatened with proceedings, the matter was referred to their Insurance Company, who eventually paid the full wages during incapacity.

In the slack season seven dressmakers" hands, some of whom had been three years in employment, were dismissed without notice. The League"s adviser applied for a week"s wage in lieu of notice for each worker. After some correspondence the money owing was handed over. This last case is a sample of many similar ones, and points to the urgent need of organisation in the dressmaking trade.

A syrup boiler in a jam-factory slipped on the boards which, owing to imperfect drainage, were slippery with syrup, and fractured her left arm.

Compensation was paid at the rate of 5s. 6d. a week.

The League has always been singularly successful in attracting the sympathy, interest, and service of able and gifted helpers, both men and women. It has been also happy in securing active co-operation with many Trade Unions, and also with societies such as the British Section of the International a.s.sociation for Labour Legislation, and the Anti-Sweating League, with both of which it is closely connected in work and sympathy.

No less than 170 societies--societies, that is to say, const.i.tuted wholly or partly of women members--are now affiliated to the League. The most recent activities of the League have been a campaign of instruction and organisation to explain the provisions of the Insurance Act, and a special effort of propaganda and organisation among the workers in some of the low-grade and ill-paid industries now coming under the Trade Boards Act.

A comparison of the list of affiliated societies now appended to the League"s Report with the societies first enrolled shows not only, as would be expected, a considerable widening of the field, but also a change in character. Whereas the societies first formed were of women only, and in London, nearly all the societies at present enrolled are mixed, and most of them are not London societies at all. The great textile societies, the weavers, winders, beamers, twisters, and drawers, card-room operatives, and so forth, form the great majority of organised women; and in these, women are organised either together with, or in close connection with, men. Some of the largest are many years older than the League, but have affiliated in comparatively recent years. There are also a vast number of Unions of miscellaneous trades--tobacco, food, tailoring, etc.; and even societies mainly masculine are affiliated, such as the London Dock and General Workers" Union (including sixty women in 1910). Many Trade Unions consisting wholly of men make donations to the League as a recognition of the importance of its work in organising women.

In Manchester there are two societies to promote the organisation of women-workers, which are doing excellent educational work in fostering the habit or tradition of a.s.sociation among workers in miscellaneous trades, many of which are totally unorganised and grievously underpaid. If we compare these Manchester societies with the policy of the Women"s Trade Union League in London, a certain difference of outlook is perceptible.

The Manchester societies prefer organising women by and for themselves; the Women"s Trade Union League is in touch with the larger Labour Movement and favours joint organisation wherever possible.

_The Movement among Unorganised Workers._--The "New Unionism for Women,"

if we may so term it, first attracted public attention in July 1888, when a few scattered paragraphs found their way even into the dignified columns of the _Times_. There was a strike among the match-girls in the East End.

Meetings were held, and next came the inevitable letters from the employers, representing the admirable condition of their factory, the desire of terrorised workers to return to work, the responsibility of "agitators" for the strike. Then a small Committee of Inquiry was started, its headquarters being at Toynbee Hall, and this Committee reported that it found the girls" complaints to be largely justified. The piece rates had been cut down on the introduction of machinery more than in proportion to the saving of labour per unit produced. Vexatious charges for brushes and excessive fines were imposed without reckoning or explanation. The wages ranged upwards from 4s.--4s. to 6s. predominantly--and never exceeded 13s.

Such were the charges, among others which were considered to be substantiated by the investigations of the four social workers, who showed their impartiality by the careful letter in which they reproduced the explanations and defence of the employers. The Toynbee Hall Committee in its third letter characterised the relation of employer and employed in this factory to be deplorable, and the wages paid as so small as to be insufficient to maintain a decent existence.

On the 16th, the _Times_ had a small paragraph describing the strike as being "the result of the cla.s.s-war which the body of Socialists have brought into action." Subsequently the London Trades Council took up the match-girls" cause, distributed strike pay to the amount of 150 among 650 boys, girls, and women, and formed a Committee of the girls to co-operate with the London Trades Council. The employers agreed to receive a deputation.

On Wednesday 18th July, the strike was declared to be at an end, after the meeting of the first deputation from the L.T.C. and the match-girls"

representatives with the directors. The directors agreed to abolish fines and the deductions complained of, to recognise an organised Trade Union among the employees in order that grievances might be represented straight to the heads instead of through the foreman, and to reinstate the workers concerned in the strike. The extraordinary success of this strike appears to have been due to the unusual steadiness and unity of the girls themselves, to the able and tactful generalship of Mrs. Besant, and largely also, of course, to the support of the London Trades Council.

As a result of this strike a Match-makers" Union was formed, and seems to have lasted until 1903; but it subsequently disappears from the Women"s Trade Union League Reports, and is known no more.

About the time of the great Dock Strike, 1889, a concerted effort to organise East End women-workers was made by Miss Clementina Black, Mrs.

Amie Hicks, and Miss Clara James. Mrs. Hicks had been in the habit of meeting some of the women rope-makers in connexion with the parochial work of St. Augustine"s Church, and had observed that many of them had bandaged hands and were suffering from injuries resulting from machinery accidents.

Inquiries made by her brought to light the fact that the women"s wages were only about 8s. to 10s. Disputes were frequent in the trade. Mrs.