Page 335 - The_story_of_the_C._W._S._The_jubilee_history_of_the_cooperative_wholesale_society,_limited._1863-1913_(IA_storyofcwsjubill00redf) (1)_Neat

The Cabinet Factories.
both are being determincdlj^ continued. During their entire
working the factories claim to have produced honest furniture,
free from the innumerable deceptions of the " garret masters "
and the cheap and sho\vj^ shops, and to have produced it under
trade-union conditions. ... As to what trade-union conditions
Avere, it was, in one outstanding instance, difficult to decide. From
before the year 1898 much friction existed between cabinet makers
and the rather better-paid body of joiners, the dispute being as to
whether shop-fitting belonged to the one trade or the other. During
five or six years the C.W.S. did its best to keep outside the quarrel,
asking the two organisations themselves to agree, when the Whole-
sale Society would fall into Hne. In March, 1903, the Manchester
branch of the Amalgamated Society of Carpenters and Joiners more
insistently urged that the C.W.S. should draw the line between
cabinet makers' and joiners' work at Broughton. The reply again
was to the effect that such differences should be settled by the
unions themselves. Later, the matter being further pressed by the
carpenters and joiners, the C.W.S.. Committee agreed " to engage
joiners to do future contracts for shop-fittmg work." But in
May the National Amalgamated Furnishing Trades Association
declined to accept the C.W.S. decision, while in July the joiners
complained that the C.W.S. was not carrying out its intention with
sufficient speed. On July 20th an additional joiner was set at
work in the shop-fitting department, whereupon some twenty-seven
cabinet makers and machine operators went on strike. The
differences between the two unions finally were resolved by the
Parhamentary Committee of the Trades Union Congress, while
Mr. J. C. Gray negotiated between the cabinet makers and the
C.W.S. After ten weeks of loss to the Wholesale Society, through
a dispute in which it had no direct interest, the return of the cabinet
makers was accepted without prejudice to those workers. But
in the followmg year, 1904, the shop-fitting was turned over to
the C.W.S. building department. The Broughton Cabinet Works
thus lost about one-haK of its trade; therefore, under the new
management of Mr. F. E. Howarth, other branches were introduced
and vigorously pushed forward to fill the gap. These included
chair making, upholstering, and bedding manufacture. Recently
the work of down and wadded quilt making has also been added,
and with equal success.
The second of the Broughton factories was that for tailoring.
This industry first was housed over the Salford border in 1895.
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