The men often regard women as unscrupulous competitors, and though they have mostly abandoned the old policy of excluding women, they are apt to try and organise them from their own point of view, without regard to the women’s special interests. Rough measures of this kind only give a further impulse to schism, confusion and bitterness. At present undeniably there is here and there a good deal of ill-feeling, especially in districts like Manchester or Liverpool, with a number of ill-organised, ill-paid trades, and competing unco-ordinated Unions.
If Trade Unionism is to be effective, if membership is to be co-extensive with the trade and compulsory, as in the future we hope it will, there is no question that better methods are needed, greater centralisation, a more carefully thought-out policy, to avoid the present waste and competition.
It is not so much a change of heart as a coherent policy that is needed. The organisation of women has been taken up merely where it was obviously and pressingly needful, in order to safeguard the interests of the men immediately concerned. In the case of the cotton weavers, an altogether special and peculiar class, the problem was comparatively simple. It was of vital importance to the men to get the women in, and on the other hand, the men could do for the women a great deal which at that stage of social development and opinion the women could not possibly have done for themselves. The cotton weavers exhibit an interlocking of interests, so patent and unmistakable that it was not only perceived but acted upon. The card-room operatives lagged behind for a time, the organisation of women being not quite so evident and apparent a necessity, but they have now almost overtaken the weavers. In other industries the problem is more complicated and has taken much longer to grasp. Take the interesting and suggestive industry of paper-making. How is the strongly organised, highly-paid paper-maker to realise that it matters very much that women should be organised in his trade? His daughter may earn pocket-money at paper-sorting, but merely as a temporary employment. She will marry a respectable artisan and abandon work on marriage. The rag-cutters, on the other hand, belong to an altogether different class, being usually wives or widows of labourers. There is not enough class feeling to bind together such different groups. It is true enough that the problem of labour is a problem of class-solidarity, and that the women must in no wise be left out. “Whoever can help to strengthen Trade Unionism among women workers will be conferring a benefit on more than the women themselves.”[40] But the depth and truth of this statement is by no means fully realised, and in many cases women have little chance of being organised by the men of their own trade. As Mr. Cole has told us, the weakness of British labour is the lack of central control and direction.
Outside the special case of the skilled workers in cotton, the organisation of women becomes more and more a question, not of craft, but of class. This is seen in the different form and type of organisation demanded by the “new unionism.” The cotton weavers need in their secretary before all things the closest and minutest acquaintance with the technical mysteries of the craft. The secretary of a modern labour Union including all sorts of heterogeneous workers cannot possibly possess intimate technical knowledge of each. Personality, power of speech, the force and warmth of character that can draw together oppressed and neglected workers and make them feel themselves one, these are the elementary gifts needed to start a workers’ Union, whether of men, women, or both together. But also if such a body is to be kept together and do effective work, it is especially in the “new unionism” that the need of central control and direction is felt. A national policy must take into consideration the needs of women and harmonise their interests with those of men. The success of the Women’s Trade Union League is very largely due, not merely to the personality of its leaders, though no doubt that has been a considerable asset, but to the fact that it has a national policy and a definite aim.
Frau Braun eleven years ago saw that the labour woman ran some danger of being caught into the feminist movement and withdrawn from her natural place as an integral part of the Labour Movement itself. It is to be hoped that she has followed English social history in the interval with sufficient closeness to be aware of the far-sighted statesmanship shown by the leaders of the Trade Union League in avoiding such a pitfall.
However unsatisfactory and inadequate the organisation of women has been and still is, a review of the situation does not suggest any inherent incapacity of women for corporate action. In the cotton weavers’ societies, although the main responsibility for organisation has rested on men’s shoulders, yet the women and girls have consistently paid contributions amounting now to a relatively high figure, and they have constantly aided in the work of recruiting new members. Experience is now showing that in certain districts where the industry is becoming more and more a woman’s trade, the women have not been lacking in capacity to take over the work of managing the Union’s affairs. The absence of women from the Committee of so many weavers’ Unions at the present day is due to inertia and long surviving habit rather than to any real incapacity. In the recent ballot on the question of political action, the enormous proportion of votes recorded shows that a large proportion of women must have used the vote. In many of the small women’s societies in Manchester a working woman is the secretary. In certain cases local Unions of women have been successful, notably the Liverpool upholstresses, the Edmonton ammunition workers and some others. The working woman is in fact beginning to show powers, hitherto unsuspected, of social work and political action. The Insurance Act has demanded women officials as “Sick Visitors” and “Pay Stewards,” and the new duties thrown on the secretaries and committee by that Act are likely to bring about an increasing demand for the participation of women. The rapidly increasing numbers of women in the Shop Assistants’ Union, the movement for a minimum wage in the co-operative factories, the increasing number of women in general labour Unions, all these are hopeful signs of a movement towards unity. The milliner and dressmaker in small establishments and the domestic servant will probably be the last to feel the rising wave. Even of these we need not despair. With the development of postal facilities, easy transit and opportunities for social intercourse, such as we may foresee occurring in the near future, there may be a considerable development of class-consciousness even among the workers among whom it is now most lacking, while the Women’s Co-operative Guild and the Women’s Labour League, in their turn, are finding a way for the association of non-wage-earning women in the working class.
Female Membership of Trade Unions, 1913.
| Occupation | Numbers. | Per cent of Total. |
| Textile— | ||
| Cotton preparing | 53,317 | 14·9 |
| Cotton spinning | 1,857 | 0·5 |
| Cotton weaving | 155,910 | 43·8 |
| Wool and worsted | 7,738 | 2·2 |
| Linen and jute | 20,689 | 5·8 |
| Silk | 4,247 | 1·2 |
| Hosiery, etc. | 4,070 | 1·1 |
| Textile printing, etc. | 9,453 | 2·6 |
| Total | 257,281 | 72·1 |
| Non-Textile— | ||
| Boot and shoe | 9,282 | 2·6 |
| Hat and cap | 3,750 | 1·1 |
| Tailoring | 9,798 | 2·7 |
| Printing | 5,893 | 1·7 |
| Pottery | 2,600 | 0·7 |
| Tobacco | 2,060 | 0·6 |
| Shop assistants | 24,255 | 6·8 |
| Other trades | 8,742 | 2·4 |
| General labour | 23,677 | 6·6 |
| Employment of Public Authorities | 9,625 | 2·7 |
| Total | 99,682 | 27·9 |
| Grand Total | 356,963 | 100·0 |