Page 337 - The_story_of_the_C._W._S._The_jubilee_history_of_the_cooperative_wholesale_society,_limited._1863-1913_(IA_storyofcwsjubill00redf) (1)_Neat

The Tailoring Factories.
stores and factories never have undertaken to satisfy demands that
were not in reason. Yet at present they cannot afford entirely to
ignore the competition of shopkeepers and manufacturers, who are
altogether unconcerned about labour so long as a supply of that
" commodity " is available Mhenever it pays them to employ it.
The lesser factory at Grove Street, E., which already has been
alluded to, exists for the service of the department under Mr. Hay
at the London Branch. Here the bespoke work began in a room
over the stables, before it was transferred to the present building,
which is separate, although adjacent to the Leman Street premises.
, . . In addition to bespoke tailoring the Pelaw Clothing Factory
specially makes pit clothing, and engineers' and shipbuilders'
clothing. It is the grief of artistic souls that distinctive dresses have
gone out of fashion. The countryman's smock disappeared long
ago, and the Lancashire miU girls' picturesque shawls and substantial
clattering clogs are threatened. The miner, in the comparatively
new coalfields of Lancashire, Yorkshire, and the IMidlands, goes
to work in old clothes which, when his whole person is blackened
by coal dust, do nothing to redeem the lost human dignity. But
so strong is custom that in the older fields of the North-East the pit
drawers of flannel kersey still remain.
In 1899 the Broughton Tailoring Factory had an experience
which anticipated that of the Cabinet Works, in so far that, originally
at any rate, the C.W.S. was only indirectly concerned. A dispute
arose at Oldham in the jMay of that year between the members of
the Amalgamated Society of Tailors and the two great distributive
societies in Oldham. It turned upon technical points arising from
changes in the trade. New machmer}' and new methods that
met a demand for factory bespoke work at a price much below the
old-fashioned cost of hand work throughout, meant an mcreasing
employment of women workers. As representing the old order the
tailors sought to counteract this effect. The Oldham Societies,
their o^\^l workers being on strike, placed certain orders with the
Broughton factory. In consequence of this, on the 16th of June, a
small number of Broughton workers left work, without notice, leaving
garments unfinished; and others joined them subsequently, until
at length the strikers numbered tliree hundred. At the Quarterly
Meeting of June 17th it was said that the workmen had sought an
interview with the C.W.S. Committee " and were given to under-
stand that they might as soon see the Emperor of China." " But
you should understand what their demand was," repUed Mr. ShiUito.
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