The Nonpartisan Leader Newspaper, September 1, 1919, Page 8

Wholesale Co-Operation in Britain Factories Owiied by Consumers Make Clothing, Shoes, Flour and Other Foods—Mines Its Own Coal—Many Other Articles Manufactured BY LIEUTENANT PAUL FUSSELL UST as the working- men in different cities found it an advantage to unite in order to' buy and sell food and clothing through a local co-operative society, so the separate societies, scattered through England, Scotland, Ireland and Wales, found it an advantage to unite with other societies for many purposes. One need was for a national policy. If each of the local societies, number- ing nearly 1,400 today, had remained separate, they would have followed different policies and many would have proved failures. An organization was clearly need- ed to encourage young societies and to counsel older ones. This organization is called the Co-Oper- ative Union, Limited. It conducts propaganda, gives legal advice, and arranges an annual confer- ence where views on co-operative subjects are ex- changed. Another need was for co-operative insurance. The separate societies, as employers of labor, had to insure against liability under the workmen’s compensation acts. They found that by banding together insurance could be obtained at lower rates than from private companies. Through the Co- Operative Insurance Society, Limited, the local so- cieties may insuye against employer’s liability, and the individual members may insure against death, fire, accident or burglary. : Still another need was for the support of the women in the co-operative movement. . In every home it is the woman who carries the pocketbook. If women could be shown that it was to their ad- vantage to trade in co-operative stores their suc- cess was assured. As early as 1883 a women’s co-operative guild was founded to spread among English women an appreciation of co-operative methods. There are similar guilds in Scotland and Ireland. The employes of the co-operative societies form a mighty army of 160,000 men and women, organ- ized into a trade union known as the Amalgamated Union of Co-Operative Employes, with a member- ship of 85,000. Its aim is to improve the conditions 077, % of labor for the co-operative employes, but it has never needed to call a strike to achieve its ends. The co-operative system, owned and controlled by working people, is naturally sympathetic to the just rights of labor. ~ The success of each local society depends largely upon the ability of the local manager. These managers are united in a National = Co-Operative Managers’ association which aims at improving the status of co-operative managers and at provid- ing an exchange of ex- perience in administra- tion and buying. This association is responsible for the rule by which the salaries of the managers are determined. By this rule each manager is paid according to the amount of business done by his society. CO-OPERATION FOR THE CO-OPERATORS — The most obvious need for. co-operation among co-operators, however, lay in the fields of purchase and production. The local societies soon found that by banding together into a central organization they could buy and sell to the sepa- rate ‘Societies cheaper than the societies could buy - individually. Two great wholesale societies were created, the Co-Op- Fussell. Machine room of the Co-O e e B e S N e This is the second in a series of articles on British co-operative movements written for the Nonpartisan Leader by Lieutenant The first article in the series, which appeared last week, dealt with retail co-operative stores. ) had an opportunity to discover at first hand the details of this people’s movement in the British Isles. American expeditionary forces in France and later was trans- ferred to Trinity college, Cambridge, Eng., and while there began his study of this subject. On a previous trip to Europe, - Lieutenant Fussell visited Sweden, Denmark, Norway, Hol- land and a part of Germany. As a soldier he was stationed in France and England, and he also visited 5 Italy, Scotland and Ireland. erative Wholesale Society, generally called the C. W. S., for England, Ireland and Wales, and the Scottish Co-Operative Wholesale Society, generally called the S. C. W. 8., for Scotland. In this article only the C. W. S. can be examined. Yet it should be remembered that similar societies are operating not only in Scotland, but also in Russia, Germany, Denmark, Switzerland, Hungary, Austria, France, Sweden, Holland, Italy and Belgium. The C. W. 8., from small beginnings in 1864, has grown to tremendous proportions. In 1918 it sold to local societies goods valued at £65,167,960, or more than $300,000,000. It has purchasing agents, not only in the principal selling cities of the United Kingdom, but also in the United States, Canada, Denmark, Spain and West Africa. Wherever the C. W. S, enters the market as a purchaser, whether it is for toothpaste or furnmiture, it is the largest buyer present, and gets the lowest possible prices. Whatever saving is made goes not to the pocket of some wealthy individual, but the 1,400 societies, and through them to their 4,000,000 members. CHEAPER TO MAKE THAN TO BUY MANY ARTICLES But the C. W. 8., in spite of its power to buy as economically as possible, finds it cheaper to pro- duce certain goods than to buy them. Last year goods to the value_of..$85,000,000 were produced in its own factories, Workshops and farms. Merely to name the full list of factories would be tedious, and yet we should note that it operates 16 mills for textiles and clothing, 10 boot and shoe fac- tories, 9 flour mills, 4 metal plants, 8 soap works and 3 tanneries, to say nothing of a coal mine and glass works, and the production of lard, jams, margarine, paint, brushes and a host of other articles. largest boot and shoe factory in the world. PAGE EIGHT RN AR A Y The writer has perative Wholesale Society boot and shoe w;)rks at Leicester, Eng., the R s In addition to operating. factories and workshops, the C. W. S. is a farmer on a large scale. It owns 32,000 acres of farming land in Eng- land, 20,000 acres of tea land in India_ and Ceylon, and 10,000 acres of wheat land in Canada. CAN BUY GOODS MADE IN OWN FACTORIES In fact, the English housewife, go- ing to market, can buy a long list of articles, knowing that they are made in factories which she helps to own and operate and that all profits will go to her own pocketbook. Here is a partial list clipped from a C. W. S. He served with the publication: Bacon Shoes Hardware Butter Cloth Mats Biscuits Corsets Mattresses Cake Flannels Margarine Chocolate Hosiery Polishes Cocoa Linings "~ Soaps Flour Shirts Starch Lard Underwear Tobacco Marmalade Tinware Cigars Mincemeat Bedsteads Cigarettes Pepper Brushes Washing Pickles Brooms machines Sauces Candles Beverages Honey Fenders Oils Tea Furniture Bird seed Vinegar Glycerine Medicines The tremendous business of the C. W. S. requires large offices and many clerks. In the central build- ing at Manchester more than 4,000 clerks are kept busy attending to the ever-growing business of the society. Altogether, there are more than 32,000 men and women on the C. W. S. payroll. h No description of the C. W. S. would be complete without a statement of the place its founders in- tended it to fill in the industrial world. It is sim- ply the wholesale and producing side of the co- operative movement, a movement which aims at the gradual establishment of a co-operative com- monwealth, where industry and trade will be car- ried on, not at the direction of private individuals who pocket enormous profits, but at the direction of the common people who make up the bulk of the world. ¢ ;i The™co-operative move in Great Britain has a direct relation to the growth of the Labor party there. Although the co-operative move came first, it was as a protection against the in- dustrial conditions, under which British labor was much more poorly paid -than his brother worker in the United States. The plan of organization un- der the union idea -to raise wages by united ac- tion came later. The first move was the protéction of workers in the pur- chasing field. Only by uniting their purchasing power were they able to withstand the economic pressure. Had it not been for these stores, the workers would have been forced either-to use in- ferior and very likely adulterated food or pay prices that they could ill afford. The co-operative ‘move solved the difficul- ty by giving the workers a price preference. 'In another series of articles which will appear in the Leader in the near fu- ture the growth of ‘the Labor party in Great Britain will ' be - dealt with. 7 (In his next article, the last of the present series, Lieutenant Fussell will discuss agricultural co-operation in Grea Britain.) =