Page 460 - The_story_of_the_C._W._S._The_jubilee_history_of_the_cooperative_wholesale_society,_limited._1863-1913_(IA_storyofcwsjubill00redf) (1)_Neat

The Story of the C.W.S.
of 1913. With closer margins in the factories especially affected,
the coming of the scale certainly wUl mean a change, a hardening
of conditions. Something will be gained and something lost; mean-
while the Wholesale Society faitlifully will have comphed with the
temper of the time, which is for a more hard and fast bargaining
between employer and employed, and rigid definitions. ... It
must be added that, on the delegates' recommendation receiving
favourable attention from the Committee, the Women's Guild
arranged a canvass for loyalty to the C.W.S. factories, by
inaugm-ating a "push the sales campaign."

The co-operators of 1860 upheld co-operation as superior to trade
unionism altogether. In the co-operative era strikes and lockouts
and unions of labour against capital were to be weapons of the past.
When in 1891 a special trade union arose within the co-operative
movement itself, the co-operative conscience felt a burden. The union
itself came out at first very mildly as an employees' association. Only
in 1911 did the Amalgamated Union of Co-operative Employees,
as it has been known since 1895, form a strike fund. Whatever
the view of the latter development, it may readily be admitted
that the earher idea of trade unionism becoming unnecessary will
not bear consideration. It was an idea that declined with an
absolute faith in profit-sharing ; for when we build upon the general
consumers, or public interest, we cannot deny any special interest
the right to prevent itself being overlooked in the process. And the
efficiency of the employees' union simply as a co-operative agent
was recognised at an early date by the C.W.S. when, during the
nineties, much advertising work was done in common. But now
we come to a time when the views of the pioneers unconsciously are
being reversed, and a zeal for trade unionism within the co-opera-
tive movement almost is threatening to push the co-operative idea
into the background. The C.W.S. has relations with many trade
unions besides the A.U.C.E. which represent shop workers and those
for whom no estabhshed trade union exists; and the more recent
problem has been to hold a true balance between the interest which
all working people have as consumers and that which is more
acutely felt by those members of famihes who are direct wage-
earners. We have seen (Chapter XXIII.) this issue arising in the
matters of the boot and shoe operatives' trade union label and
compulsory trade unionism. The attitude taken by the Society
toward the former in 1911 was consistent with the voting in
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