Reasons For Industrail Unrest

Question 1

What were some of the reasons for industrial unrest?

Answer 1

• By 1912, cost of living was 14% higher than 1916
• from 1910, fall in level of unemployment- workers willing to confront employers
• Social reforms of the Lib party, gap between rich and poor widening. The improved education of the workforce meant that there was an increasing awareness of inequalities reported by Booth & R’tree
• the 1906 Trade Dispute act removed restrain that unions were legally liable for cost that employers incurred from strikes
• unions had joined together into federations, this gave them more power, e.g. Miners Fed
• workers felt let down by Labour Party. Strikes better alternative than political structure
• growing agitation by syndicalist (use of violence to destroy alternative than political structure)
• direct action became increasingly seen as an option to the militants unions