The Post Office Civil Servants’ Unions demand the adoption of the Bradford Committee Report. Lord Stanley, Postmaster General, applies the words “blackmail” and “blood-sucking” to the postal employees’ methods. Captain Norton moves for a House of Commons Select Committee. Mr. Austen Chamberlain, Chancellor of the Exchequer, in vain asks the Opposition Party’s support for a Select Committee to which shall be referred the question of the feasibility of establishing a permanent, non-political Commission which shall establish general principles for settling disputes between the Civil Servants and the Government of the day. Captain Norton’s Motion is lost, nine Ministerial supporters voting for it, and only two Opposition members voting against it. Mr. J. Henniker Heaton’s appeal to the British public for “An End to Political Patronage.” The Post Office employees, in the campaign preceding the General Election of January, 1906, induce nearly 450 of the 670 parliamentary candidates who succeeded in being elected, to pledge themselves to vote for a House of Commons Select Committee on Post Office Wages. Immediately upon the opening of Parliament, the Sir H. Campbell-Bannerman Liberal Ministry gives the Post Office employees a House of Commons Select Committee.
On September 17, 1904, the Postal Telegraph Clerks’ Association unanimously resolved: “That this Conference expresses its indignation that the Postmaster General, having appointed a Committee of his own choosing to inquire into the Post Office wages … now, for no good reason, has rejected the Report. This Conference, therefore, calls upon the Postmaster General to adopt immediately, as dated from May 9, 1904, the whole of the ameliorative recommendations contained in the Bradford Committee’s Report; but the Postal Telegraph Clerks’ Association reserves to itself the right to object to, and protest against, any recommendations which may be considered by this Association to be of a restrictive and retrograde character.”[225]
A Merchant in Politics
In the evening of the same day a mass meeting was addressed by Mr. W. W. Rutherford, M. P., the head of the firm of Miller, Peel, Hughes and Rutherford, Liverpool. Mr. Rutherford had been Lord Mayor of Liverpool in 1902. He said: “He ventured to think that the great Postal and Telegraph Service was suffering because its position and its grievances had not been made thoroughly intelligible to the general public…. That was not a matter touching a few hundreds of people in a hole and corner of the country, but was one of extreme importance affecting no less than 185,000 people…. The real foes of the employees were the highly paid officials at the head of the Department, who were quite content to draw their salaries and show that the Government was making four or five million pounds sterling[226] out of the public and the Postal Service.”
Mr. Rutherford’s speech recalls to mind the fact that the Australian cousins of the British civil servants have learned to deal with their “foes” by compelling the popular branches of the Australian Parliaments to reduce the salaries of offensive officials, or to drive them out of the Service by means of “fishing” Parliamentary Committees, appointed to report on—and to condemn—the offending officials.
On August 14, 1904, the London Branch of the Postal Telegraph Clerks’ Association held a meeting, at which Mr. C. H. Garland,[227] the Secretary, spoke of Mr. Thomas Bayley, M. P., as one who “had rendered valuable service to their cause in the House of Commons.” The presiding officer, Mr. R. H. Davis, said: “In burking the recommendations of the Committee they could not help feeling that the Post Office authorities had been guilty of a breach of faith. Were they going to take the rebuff lying down? The London Committee were determined to fight the matter harder than ever. By the time Parliament assembled next year, they would have an effective organization at their disposal, and the enemy would feel their pressure very considerably.”[228]
The Special Conference of the Postal Telegraph Clerks’ Association held on September 17, 1904, resolved to hold mass meetings in all the district centres between then and next February [opening of Parliament] to protest against the action of the Postmaster General. The series to conclude with a “monster” demonstration in London immediately before the opening of Parliament.[229]
On July 6, 1905, while the House of Commons was in Committee of Supply, and was considering the vote upon the Post Office, there was a long and instructive debate upon the Report of the Bradford Committee.[230] Lord Stanley, Postmaster General, opened the debate with a quotation from The Post,[231] the Post Office employees’ organ. The statement quoted read: “Not only do we object to the composition of the [Bradford] Committee, but we take the strongest exception to its terms of reference. The inquiry as to whether our wages are adequate or otherwise becomes a farce if their adequacy is to be judged by the standard of wages of the open labor market. No such comparison would be reasonable or fair. There is no other employer who fixes his own prices or makes an annual profit of $20,000,000. There is no other class of work which can be compared to the Post Office work, neither any other employee who can be compared with the Post Office servants…. Surely Mr. Chamberlain does not think we should regard such an inquiry as final. If he does, the sooner his mind is disabused the better.” Lord Stanley next discussed the manner in which the Bradford Committee had made recommendations which were based on no evidence whatever. For instance, in order to improve the chances of promotion, the Committee had recommended the creation of additional higher posts—“for which there was no work.” In one Department of the Post Office that recommendation would mean the increase in the number of overseers from 250 to 900. Lord Stanley next made lengthy comparisons between the wages received by letter sorters and telegraphists on the one hand, and employees of equal intelligence and attainments in the service of private companies on the other hand. He showed that in London the maximum wage of the sorters and telegraphists was equal to the salary of the “non-college-trained certified teacher,” and that in such provincial cities as Hull, Swansea and Exeter it was larger. “The only comparison which was not entirely upon his [the Postmaster General’s] side was that with the clerks in the cable companies, who were paid more than the Post Office cable room operators. But the work of the cable companies’ operators was more arduous, and there was liability to be sent abroad at any moment. But he had granted the Post Office cable room operators an increase of pay.” He added that the ultimate aggregate cost of the increases in pay made since the publication of the Bradford Committee’s Report would be $642,000 a year.[232]