Labour's First Year : 1945-46
1946 1946 1940s 27 pages WORKERS' CONTROL The establishment of Workers' Control in all industries under Common Ownership is a fundamental policy of both Common Wealth and the Independent Labour Party. But what about the Labour Party? Before we consider the scanty pronouncements a...
| Institution: | MCR - The Modern Records Centre, University of Warwick |
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| Language: | English English |
| Published: |
London : Common Wealth Publications Committee
1946
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| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | http://hdl.handle.net/10796/8C1E64D4-E2B3-4980-9BBF-E7F88E27F7AC http://hdl.handle.net/10796/7EA0F583-813E-4F02-BBE0-F6D950149445 |
| Summary: | 1946
1946
1940s
27 pages
WORKERS' CONTROL The establishment of Workers' Control in all industries under Common Ownership is a fundamental policy of both Common Wealth and the Independent Labour Party. But what about the Labour Party? Before we consider the scanty pronouncements and still briefer achievements of Labour in this sphere, it might be as well to clarify our own minds as to what we mean by the term "Workers' Control." It is often still thought of as a form of Syndicalism — the control of each industry by its own workers in their own interests, more or less regardless as to whether these interests are likely to clash with those of the rest of the community. Needless to say, few Socialists accept pure Syndicalism to-day, and Workers' Control has come to mean direct control by the worker of only some of the things which affect him in his working life, although it also means his indirect control of the higher direction of industry as a whole through his representatives in Parliament. Under a minimum definition, then, the workers in each factory or similar organisation should directly control all welfare and disciplinary matters. In each industry they should directly control the fixation of relative wage-rates as between grades of worker. But most important of all, they must be entitled to take part actively in the development of technological advances in their places of wrok [work]. The Worker and Production Control over welfare and discipline are obviously the workers' best protection against the petty tyrannies of impersonal and bureaucratic managements. This argument applies equally to the right to participate in decisions on production questions, but there is a further advantage in such participation — it can be viewed as a necessary insurance against the dangers of inefficiency and lack of enterprise likely to occur in over-centralised managements divorced from a detailed knowledge of day-to-day industrial routine. This conception of Workers' Control as a concomitant of efficiency is not as yet widely accepted. It is true that Joint Production Committees have had a certain vogue during the War, 18
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| Physical Description: | TEXT |