HC Deb 18 August 1919 vol 119 c1991

One reason why labour is being induced to lend countenance to that policy is a reason which is creditable to its intentions and its desires. It is due to the fallacy that the less you work the more work there will be for others. There never was a more fatal error. There never was a more fatal fallacy. You have only got to look at the coal trade. The reduction in the [...]out of coal is at the present moment depriving people of employment. If it go on, it will throw hundreds of thousands out of employment in this country. You have only got to work it out to its inevitable consequence, and you will find that deliberately to reduce output means in the end all-round unemployment on a gigantic scale. It is important, therefore, that that fallacy should be exploded, especially by those who speak with authority to labour. It is difficult for them to speak. [LABOUR MEMBERS: "No, no; we can speak out all right!"] I know the courage of my hon. Friends, and I am perfectly certain that they will do so, because they realise as well as anyone in this House that it is a very dangerous policy to pursue and encourage, and a disastrous one for labour. The price of food will go up, the cost of material will go up, and, what is still worse, we shall not get food for this country, because you cannot live for ever on borrowed food. You will not get raw material to this country. There will be no work for those who manipulate and transform and transfigure it into the beautiful things into which British hands can transfigure any material. It is a disastrous policy for all classes. That is why I appeal to employers and to workmen to get rid of this ruinous fallacy, which seems to possess the minds of hundreds of thousands at the present time.