Final report : industrial health and efficiency / Health of Munition Workers Committee.

  • Great Britain. Health of Munition Workers Committee.
Date:
1918
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Final report : industrial health and efficiency / Health of Munition Workers Committee. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    64/198 page 60
    (g) “‘ Knowing your interest in the details of these matters, we would like to mention how useful has been the installing of a number of small tea depéts, distributed throughout the shops, which are open for a quarter- of-an-hour in the afternoons, and again for a quarter-of-an-hour during the night shift, for the sale of tea and cakes. This has been done that we might put an end to the promiscuous tea making that went on previously. The running of these tea depdts has been only possible by the existence of the canteen, and from an administrative point of view, we are indebted to the canteen management that it has been possible to adopt this system of tea depéts.” 258. Such declarations are, after all, substantial evidence and they confirm the conviction of the Com- mittee as to the benefit arising as a result of a good Industrial Canteen. The Committee have been impressed not only with the improved nutrition manifested by the users of the Canteen, but by a lessened tendency to excessive consumption of alcohol, by the prevalence of the spirit of harmony and content- ment engendered, and by a declared increase in efficiency and output. CONCLUSIONS. 259. From what has been said in the present Section it will be understood that the Committee were convinced at a very early stage of their inquiries of the value and, indeed, necessity of establishing industrial canteens in order to provide for the proper nourishment of munition workers. As, however, the Central Control Board (Liquor Traffic), of which Lord D’Abernon was Chairman, had in June, 1915, appointed (under the statutory powers conferred on them by Defence of the Realm Regulation No. 5 of 1915) a Canteen Committee (the Chairman of which was Sir George Newman), the Health of Munition Workers Committee deemed it inexpedient to intervene in the work which that Canteen Committee had already commenced. Accordingly the burden of work in connection with the establishment of industrial canteens has fallen upon the Canteen Committee of the Liquor Control Board, assisted by His Majesty’s Office of Works, who have thus facilitated the supply of proper and sufficient nourishment for the munition worker not only in the interests of sobriety, but also in the interests of industrial efficiency.* In the first enthusiasm of this great movement a number of voluntary assistants and voluntary workers undertook the responsible duties in connection with the establishment and main- tenance of canteens. Eventually, however, it became necessary owing to the magnitude of the under- taking that the State should shoulder increased responsibilities in the matter. The Munitions of War Act, 1915, provided that “controlled” employers, in which category were included practically all manufacturers of munitions, in the wide meaning that modern warfare imparted to the term, were to receive only their standard pre-war profits plus one-fifth, the remainder being paid to the Exchequer. It seemed hardly reasonable to expect them to sacrifice profits so rigidly limited in order to provide canteens for their workers, and it could fairly be argued that, as the advantages of the increased output anticipated from the establishment of industrial canteens would accrue to the State, the State should find the money. On the initiative of the Liquor Control Board it was therefore decided that “controlled ~ employers should be allowed to charge to revenue the expenditure which they might incur with the approval of the Board on the establishment of canteens at their works ; in other words, that the cost of the establishment of canteens should be borne from funds which would otherwise accrue to the Exchequer. At the same time the Minister gave instructions for the provision, where necessary, at all Government Munition establishments (Royal Arsenals, National Factories, &c.) of adequate canteen accommodation at the expense of the State, and entrusted the Board with the general responsibility for the organisation of the canteens at these establishments. 260. The Liquor Control Board have thus been the responsible authority for the organisation of industrial canteens in munition works throughout the country. They established the necessary depart- mental and expert staff for the effective performance of this duty, and in its execution have through their representatives visited all the larger and many of the smaller munition works, and have urged the provision of canteens wherever a real and undoubted need was found to exist, whether that need arose on grounds of liquor control or of nutrition of the munition worker. The Board have made it their study to do all that was possible to assist employers in the design, equipment and management of canteens. The services of their expert staff have been placed freely at the disposal of employers, and they have published a handy compendium of information on these subjects in the form of a pamphlet entitled “‘ Feeding the Munition Worker,” to the usefulness of which they have received numerous testimonies. 261. The policy of the Liquor Control Board, with which the Committee have fully concurred, has been first to encourage the employer or owner to make suitable provision for canteen accommodation where necessary ; secondly, to facilitate such provision by voluntary or other agencies ; or thirdly, to ~ establish a canteen themselves, either managing directly or handing over the management to a properly constituted committee of employers and workmen. At the end of 1917 some 840 industrial canteens had been established in National and Controlled Munition Factories and at docks concerned in transport in connection with the war (at an approximate cost of upwards of 1} millions). The canteens estab- lished under the auspices of the Liquor Control Board have been, with few exceptions, known as “temperance ” or “ dry ’’ canteens—that is to say, no intoxicants have been supplied. In a few excep- tional cases the Liquor Board have made special Orders providing for the “on” sale and consumption of beer limited in specific gravity and in quantity purchaseable. Exceptional conditions in various * See First [Cd. 8117], Second [Cd. 8243], Third [Cd. 8558] and Fourth [Cd. 9055] Reports of the Central Control Board (Liquor Traffic) appointed under the Defence of the Realm Consolidation Act, 1914, and the Defence of the Realm (Amendment) (No. 3) Act, 1915. J
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