Colonel Lord H. CAVENDISH-BEN-TINCKasked the Minister of Munitions how many women and girls have been thrown out of work through no fault of their own by the dispute at Barrow, and if he is aware that a great many of them are living far away from their homes, and have drawn no wages for the whole of last week, and what steps he proposes to take to provide for them?
§ The PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY to the MINISTRY OF MUNITIONS (Mr. Kellaway)I am aware that a number of women have been thrown out of work by the action of the men at Barrow in striking, but I am not aware of the exact number. I much regret the distress thus inflicted, but the responsibility must rest entirely with the men. While the Government cannot make itself responsible for relieving the women of the hardship caused them by the strike, I have instructed the local Welfare officer of the Ministry to consult with the local authorities with a view to seeing whether the difficulties of the position of the-women can be mitigated by voluntary effort.
§ Mr. ANDERSONIs the hon. Member aware that many of these women, at the direct invitation of the Ministry, have come from as far as Belfast, and from other parts of Ireland, and that they are no more responsible for what has now happened than if there had been a breakdown of machinery; and are the women going to be stranded, and neither the employers nor the Ministry accept responsibility for them?
§ Mr. KELLAWAYI am fully alive to the very serious position which has been created for these women by the action of the strikers, and, as my answer has shown, the Ministry is doing what is in its. 1111 power, but if we had the desire we have certainly not the power to relieve these women at the expense of the State.
§ Colonel Sir CHARLES SEELYWhy should not the Ministry of Munitions do what private employers constantly do in difficulties of that kind, and that is make an advance to these women against their future wages, say, 10s. a week, or something of that sort? I for one have done it very often. You practically never lose any money whatever. They always repay the money.
§ Mr. KELLAWAYIn this case the Ministry of Munitions are not the employers. These women are now employed by a private firm controlled by the Ministry.
§ Sir C. SEELYWhy should not the Ministry of Munitions ask the private employers to do it?
§ Mr. ALDENIs the hon. Gentleman aware that the Ministry of Munitions was in exactly the same position with regard to the workpeople in the case of the explosion in East London as they are with regard to these women? The Ministry of Munitions immediately stepped in and helped them.
§ Mr. KELLAWAYI may say, with regard to the question of the right hon. Baronet, that the question has been discussed informally with the firm concerned, and I understand that the firm do not see their way to relieve these women. [HON. MEMBERS: "Oh!"]
§ Mr. MacVEAGHWhat were their excess profits last year?
§ Mr. KELLAWAYWe should be creating a very serious precedent indeed if the Government, whenever a certain number of workpeople were thrown out of employment as a result of the action of another body of workpeople, were to relieve them of their distress.
§ Mr. ANDERSONI would like to ask whether these are the same women who the hon. Member himself said the other day had saved England during this crisis?
§ Mr. KELLAWAYThey are amongst the women in the country who have done magnificent service.
§ Mr. PRINGLEAnd yet you will allow them to starve.
§ Mr. KELLAWAYThe position at present is this: a mass meeting of the men was held this morning, and that was followed by a ballot, the result of which, it was hoped, would be known by 3 o'clock. The result has not yet reached me.