Workers' Movements Flashcards
Describe the Newcastle keelmen
- 1699
- worked on small boats loading coal onto sea-going ships on the river Tyre
- banded together to give themselves more power to negotiate with their employers regarding wages and conditions
Describe the Combination Acts
- 1779, 1800
* prevented combinations of either workers or employers
Describe the Luddites
a group of workers who used force to try and protect their status because of the new technology
Describe friendly societies
- groups of skilled workers (could afford subscriptions of 2 shillings a week)
- more effective
- paid sick or unemployment pay for more than a year, made payments to widows
Describe general unions
- Grand National Consolidated Trade Union (GNCTU)
- National Union of Mineworkers
- National Union of Railwaymen
- 10% members were women- mostly textile mills in Lancashire and Yorkshire
Describe the formation of the Tolpuddle Martyrs
- February 1834- six agricultural labourers in Tolpuddle, Dorset, tried to form a Union
- average farmer’s wage was 10 shillings a week
- wages cut for the 3rd time recently, to 7 shillings a week, wanted a wage rise
- Combination Acts has been repealed, trade unions were legal
- led by George Loveless, local Methodist Preacher
- had to make an oath to join
When was the Act Against Unlawful Oaths made?
• 1797
Describe the punishment of the Tolpuddle Martyrs
- James Frampton- local landowner found out
- George Loveless said illegality was unintentional
- all were sentences to seven years transportation (maximum sentence)
Describe the consequences of the Tolpuddle Martyrs
- 21st April 1834- 200,000 people (mostly workers) met at Copenhagen Fields, London, marched to Parliament
- petition with 800,000 names demanding their release
- families were supported for 3 years by contributions organised by Unions- protests continued
- 1837- repeal
- London Dorchester Committee raised money and bought farms for the men in Essex
- spent rest of lives campaigning for working men’s rights
Describe George Loveless
- 13th June 1837- first to return from transportation
- wrote Victims of Whiggery (best-selling pamphlet)- cost 4d, profits went to families
- widely quoted at Chartist meetings throughout the country
Describe transportation
- used in Stuart times (1787)
- alternative to death penalty
- 100,000 initial settlers in North America were indentured labourers or criminals
- harsh conditions- many died en route or were worked to death/died of disease
- had to pay passage to come home after sentence ended
- officially ended in 1868
Describe the Amalgamated Society of Engineers
- subscription of 1 shilling a week
* 1870- 35,000 members
Describe the Master and Servants Act
- 1823
- illegal for workers to break their contract with their employer; could not go on strike
- used repeatedly by courts
Describe Hernby v Close
- 1867
* Bradford Union prevented from getting its money back from a treasurer who had abandoned with it
Describe the trade unions in Sheffield
- 1870s
- cutlery trade
- 56 different unions
- Corn grinders had 14 members
- Scythe makers had 55 members
Describe the London builders strike
- September 1859
- demanded a 9-hour day
- local strike by masons working for Messrs Trollope spread
- other master builders locked out their workers who refused to sign a pledge not to join a union or go on strike
- Unions sent money to support the workers
- February 1860- compromise; allowed unions, ten-hour day
Describe trade councils
- 1860s
- most new industrial towns had them
- union delegates would meet
Describe the Trade Union Congress
- 1868
- national co-ordinating council
- annual meeting of delegates
- 1888- first resolution- equal pay for men and women doing the same job
Describe male suffrage
1867, 1884- most men received the vote
Describe A.J. Mundella as a factory owner
- pro-union employer
- Nottingham hosiery manufacturer
- made a fortune adopting most up-to-date machines and techniques to make stockings
- 1847- 4,000 workers
- paid high wages, good working conditions, 9-hour days
- system of industrial arbitration to settle disputes
Describe A.J. Mundella as an MP
- became liberal MP
- 1871- guided first ever Trade Union Act through Parliament
- 1872- guided Act to reduce amount of time women and children worked in coal mines through Parliament
- unoffical spokesman for trade unions in House of Commons
When did unions of non- skilled workers emerge
• 1880s
How were the non-skilled unions catalysed into formation
- gap between rich and poor had widened significantly
* rich people from new towns were moving to the suburbs- workers had to become more self-reliant
Describe Annie Besant
- spent whole life campaigning for workers’ rights
- socialist, orator
- 1877- stood trial with Charles Bradlaugh for publishing a book on birth control- found guilty of publishing an obscene book- sentenced to 6 months prison- acquitted on technicality
- The Link- weekly journal
- The White Slaves of London
Describe ‘The White Slaves of London’
- article written by Annie Besant in The Link
- about women workers at Bryant and May
- 5 shillings for 70 hour weeks
- dangerous and unpleasant work
- Phossy jaw- using white phosphorus (banned in many countries) to make matches could lead to brain tumours and death
Describe the match girls’ strike
- 1888
- employers asked the workers to sign a document saying they were fairly treated- most refused and went on strike
- Annie Besant helped them to formulate their demands, publicised their cause
- took 50 to MPs to demand a fairer wage
- they organised a union
- strike lasted 5 weeks
Describe the London Gas Workers Union
- March 1889
- meeting in East London- 800 workers joined
- demanded 8-hour day
- after 2 weeks- 3,000 members
- employers conceded
Describe the London Docks grievances
- 12,000 labourers competing for 5,000 jobs loading and unloading ships
- some skilled, some on regular contract, most ‘casuals’
Describe ‘casuals’
- turned up in the morning to see if there was any work
- employed for an hour, a morning or a day
- paid 4d per hour
Describe the demands at South Quay
- Docker’s tanner to be paid 6d per hour
- overtime to be paid at 8d per hour
- minimum employment of 4 hours
Describe the London Dock Strike
- 22nd August- whole of Port of London at a standstill
- pickets stopped non-strikers working
- processions and mass meetings held daily
- sympathy strikes all over London (postmen, coal men, railway porters)
- food relief raised by organisations was handed out
- late August- £30,000 gift from trade unions in Australia
- September- most demands conceded
Describe the growth of unions
- between 1888 and 1891- membership doubled
* trade and wages were good, unemployment was falling
Describe the May Day rally
- 1890
* demanded 8-hour day
Describe the Grand National Consolidated Trade Union
- mostly in London, skilled workers
- 1834- flourished very briefly
- tried to combine workers in all trades all over the country
- claimed to have 500,000 members (acc 16,000)
- proposed National Holiday or general strike to improve wages
- quickly disintegrated
- developed the idea of worker solidarity
Describe blacklegs
- non-union workers
* broke strikes
Describe the methods used to break strikes
- lock-outs; attempt to starve
- government used to troops to protect blacklegs, and to force strikers to give way
- used law courts to restrict union power
Describe the Amalgamated Society of Engineers
- 1897
- locked-out for 6 months
- rather than to concede an 8-hour day
- workers forced to return to new machinery and conditions
Describe Lyons v Wilkins
- 1896
* illegal to picket a workplace to stop blacklegs, even peacefully
Describe the Taff Vale judgment
- 1901
* any union going on strike had to pay damages for the loss of income by strike action
Describe the Independent Labour Party
- 1892- Kier Hardy elected to Parliament as an Independent, then Independent Labour
- 1893- formation of party
- result of strikes
- 1898- West Ham became first local council controlled by Labour
- stood for elections for Poor Law guardians and school boards
Describe Kier Hardy
- 1856- 1915
- illegitimate son of a servant
- aged 8- baker’s delivery boy
- aged 11- coal miner
- taught himself literacy
- led coal strike in Scotland
- 1906- first leader of the Labour Party in Parliament
- supported women’s suffrage and equality
