Manifesto by the Cambrian Combine Workmen
To our Fellow-workers in
the Mines of South Wales.
Cardiff
Conference on Saturday next, May 27th,
1911.
COMRADES
We issue this Manifesto
in the form of an Appeal: but it will probably
be a bitter appeal, because it issues from
sore hearts.
On Saturday next, you will be expected to send
a Delegate from every Lodge in the Coalfield
to the Conference at Cardiff. You will further
be asked to authorise your Delegate to vote
at that Conference in favour of recommending
the Cambrian Workmen to accept the proffered
terms.
Fellow-workers, for
our sakes, for your own sakes, for the sakes
of all those who are dear to you, we ask you
NOT TO DO THIS, and
we will try to give you SOME REASONS
WHY YOU SHOULD NOT.
We confidently hope
that when you have considered the matter,
you will agree with us that THE
TERMS OFFERED ARE WORSE THAN DEFEAT. Remember,
that we have fought a hard fight against tremendous
odds, and we would like to impress upon you
that THE METHOD OF FIGHTING WAS
NOT OF OUR SEEKING. You decided that for
us, for by your ballot vote you told us that
MID-RHONDDA WAS TO BE THE COCKPIT OF THE
FIGHT. We accepted
the position with misgivings, but manfully
entered on the fight, and we think you will
give us the credit for having fought well,
and we are not beaten - far from it! With
your assistance (and we ask you to look at
the position fairly and dispassionately),
we will not only win out, but win something
substantial for you as well.
We have been deliberately
and FOULLY MISREPRESENTED by
a large section of the public Press. We have
been BLUDGEONED BY THE POLICE. ONE
OF OUR COMRADES LOST HIS LIFE in contending
with the police. TWO COMRADES, in
the stress of the struggle through illness
and privation, COMMITTED SUICIDE. Many
of our fellows have suffered IMPRISONMENT.
Some are now in prison who have foully had
their liberty sworn away, and are as innocent
of any crime as any reader of this Appeal.
If we could only tabulate even a part of the
SUFFERING AND MISERY ENDURED BY
OUR WOMEN AND CHILDREN, we
feel sure that you will agree with us that
the fight has gone too far and the suffering
too great, that we should now be handed over
to the mercy of the D. A. Thomas Combine.
We ask you to say, friends, that the time
has arrived when the surrender policy of our
apologetic leaders must stop. They have not
realised what it means to us in suffering.
We know what questionable use Mr. F.L. Davis
and other employers have made of the fact
that Mabon and Mr. D. Watts Morgan recommended
the terms rather than face the rigours of
winter. But this is no excuse for the childlike
way that Mabon and Mr. Tom Richards have allowed
Mr. Llewellyn (the [sic.] General Manager
of the Combine) for the SECOND TIME
TO FOOL THEM SO PALPABLY. It
is reported that Mr. Llewellyn seemed to be
the happiest man of the group on the evening
of May 15th, when the proposed Settlement
was arrived at. This might well be so. Under
this agreement he will get his full pound
of flesh; but we, after all our suffering,
get ABSOLUTELY NO SECURITY.
We, at some of the
Cambrian Pits, know something of the working
of these precious Boards. At Clydach Vale
in 1901, after a five and a half months' Strike,
a Conciliation Board was formed for the Cambrian
alone, with the late Judge Owen as Independent
Chairman. The working of that Board was the
worst thing the Clydach Vale men ever knew.
Under it the WORKING CONDITIONS
WERE WHITTLED DOWN WITH A VENGEANCE.
Mabon and Mr. Tom Richards knew all about
this, yet seemed to have conveniently forgotten
the matter in the present negotiations. It
was this Board that made the reputation of
Mr. Leonard W. Llewellyn, and laid the foundation
of the present Combine. From 1901 to March,
1905, the conditions of these men became SO
EVIL and the men
SO DISORGANISED, that
the pits were NOT EXAMINED BY THE
WORKMEN in their
own interests for some 18 months prior to
the explosion that occurred in the No. 1 Pit
in March, 1905. We have a bitter experience
of these tying-up Boards.
The terms now offered have been twice rejected;
once through a ballot, now they are again
offered with A MOST OBJECTIONABLE
ADDITION to them.
We ask you, fellow-workmen, to note that the
Executive Council are evenly divided on the
question of recommending these terms. 11 voted
for the terms, 7 against: and 4 LEFT
THE ROOM rather
than take part in the recommendation.
When the Executive decided to confine the
fight to the Combine area, Mr. D. A. Thomas
said that this put him and his company on
velvet. In these negotiations Mr. Llewellyn
has undoubtedly had our leaders on toast.
The employers (represented by four of the
keenest men in the country, in the persons
of Messrs Davis, Griffiths, Heppel, and Dalxiel)
felt it incumbent upon them to call in for
consultation Messrs Callaghan, Pullin, and
Llewellyn. But our benighted Representatives
thought they were more than a match for the
seven, hence the present debacle.
We ask you, fellow-workmen, to examine the
present terms offered. You will find there
is absolutely no bottom to these SPOOF
ASSURANCES. See
Clause 3 of Agreement, and you will find that
the Independent Chairman HAS ABSOLUTELY
NO TANGIBLE BASIS
to work upon. Mr. F. L. Davis is very anxious
that nothing shall enter into the Cambrian
Settlement that will imperil the Conciliation
Board. Small wonder! The present agreement
under the Board is admittedly 15 per cent
worse than the worst Sliding Scale we ever
had.
We know something, too, of the difficulties
of the rest of the Coalfield. We have a shrewd
idea of what Mr. D. A. Thomas meant when he
said, "He would readily give an undertaking
to supplement low wages by allowance as is
customary throughout the Coalfield"!
We know also that your position has not been
better, but rather worse, since we've been
out. We know that you find our levies burdensome.
But are you willing to have paid all these
levies for less than nothing, that we should
be worse off and you no better? Would you
not far rather that we should win out and
you also to get an assured wage when you've
worked for it?
Well! fellow-workmen, there is A
SURE AND A CERTAIN WAY, and
that is not by voting us back to work and
STARVATION AND EVERY INDIGNITY,
as was and is unfortunately the lot of the
Aberdare men through no fault of theirs, because
we know they fought valiantly.
For your manhood's sake, DO NOT
SEEK TO AVOID YOUR LEVIES BY THIS METHOD.
See rather that you
send a mandate to Cardiff, not to hound us
back against our will, but with a solid mandate
that SOUTH WALES SHOULD GO UNITEDLY
TO THE CONFERENCE OF JUNE 14th AT LONDON,
AND DEMAND THAT NATIONAL ACTION
be taken on the resolution now before that
Conference, for an 8s. Minimum for all Colliers
and 5s. for all unskilled labourers below
that point. By these means, and these only,
can you save us, save the Aberdare men, and
save yourselves.
If you send us back, then the national minimum
wage may be shelved for years. But if, on
the other hand (as we ask you in all sincerity),
you do not send us back, then the Federation
must take national action for the 8s. minimum
for Wales, England, and Scotland, or they
must put up the shutters. A Federation that
cannot or will not protect us is not worth
supporting.
Finally, avail yourselves of this opportunity
on Saturday next at Cardiff, or it may be
many years before we again get such a golden
opportunity.
Yours on behalf of the Cambrian Combine Workmen,
WM. JOHN
N. REES
N. HARCOMBE
J. IVINS
J. HOPLA
T. SMITH
