“That the Labour Party press for nationalization of all the means of production, distribution and exchange.”
The arguments of the proposer were that because of the existence of landlordism and the power of the landlords, the people had been driven off the land into towns and overseas, with the result that this country had to depend on other countries for food-stuffs. There was no discussion, and the resolution was passed nem. con.
The Labour Addendum to the Whitley Report, 1918
The now famous “Committee on Relations between Employers and Employed,” known as the “Whitley Committee,” which advocated the institution in industries of Joint Industrial Councils, Joint District Councils and Works’ Committees, presented the last of their five Reports to the Prime Minister in 1918, dated July 1, 1918 (Parliamentary Paper 1918, Cd. 9153). The Trade Union members[4] of the Committee who signed the report appended this note:
“By attaching our signatures to the General Reports we desire to render hearty support to the recommendations that Industrial Councils or Trade Boards, according to whichever are the more suitable in the circumstances, should be established for the several industries or businesses and that these bodies, representative of employers and employed, should concern themselves with the establishment of minimum conditions and the furtherance of the common interests of their trades.
“But while recognizing that the more amicable relations thus established between Capital and Labour will afford an atmosphere generally favourable to industrial peace and progress, we desire to express our view that a complete identity of interests between Capital and Labour cannot be thus effected, and that such machinery cannot be expected to furnish a settlement for the more serious conflicts of interests involved in the working of an economic system primarily governed and directed by motives of private profit.”
The Industrial Programme of 1918
The new constitution of the Party which was adopted in 1918 was described as a scheme to secure for the producers by hand or by brain the full fruits of their industry and the most equitable distribution of them upon the basis of common ownership of the means of production coupled with the application to each industry or service of the best system of popular administration and control, and to promote the economic emancipation of the people, especially those who depend upon their own exertions by hand or by brain for the means of life. In explanation of this rather vague programme, the Party stated in a contemporary leaflet, that they intended that the supplies of food and other necessaries of life, especially bread, meat, milk, sugar, butter and margarine, water, coal, light, and transport by rail, steamer, tram and bus, now almost entirely controlled by monopolists, combines, trusts and rings, should be acquired by the State to be administered nationally or municipally solely in the interest of the public and the consumers. In the Party’s proposals for reconstruction as contained in Labour and the New Social Order, which was finally settled by the Labour Party Conference in June 1918, Labour declared that it stood for:
“The progressive elimination from the control of industry of the private capitalist, individual or joint-stock, and the setting free of all who work, whether by hand or by brain, for the service of the community and the community only,”
and registered its refusal