THE BRADFORD COMMITTEE REPORT
The Bradford Committee ignores its reference. It recommends
measures that would cost $6,500,000 a year, in the hope of
satisfying the postal employees, who had asked for $12,500,000
a year. Lord Stanley, Postmaster General, rejects the Bradford
Committee's Report; but grants increases in wages and salaries
aggregating $1,861,500 a year.
In the preceding chapter it was stated that the Government in August,
1903, appointed Sir Edward Bradford, Mr. Charles Booth, Mr. Thomas
Brodrick, Mr. R. Burbidge, and Mr. Samuel Fay a Committee "to inquire
into the scales of pay received by the undermentioned classes of
Established Post Office Servants, and to report whether, having regard
to the conditions of their employment and to the rates current in other
occupations, the remuneration of (a) Postmen, (b) Sorters (London),
(c) Telegraphists (London), (d) Sorting Clerks and Telegraphists
(Provincial) is adequate." No further question was submitted to the
Committee.
The Committee, in May, 1904, reported: "We have not seen our way to
obtain any specific evidence as to the comparative rates of wages
current in other occupations. So far as regards this portion of the
reference to us,[209] we came to the conclusion that no really useful
purpose would be served by asking employers of labor to furnish precise
details of the wages paid by them. Certain official information is
already available, being obtained and published from time to time
by the Board of Trade. This information, supplemented by our own
experience, affords more reliable data than any particulars we could
hope to obtain in the way of evidence within the limits of an inquiry
of reasonable duration."
[Sidenote: _Business Methods not applicable in State Service_]
"Moreover, it is difficult to make any valid comparison between a
National Postal Service and any form of private industrial employment,
the entire conditions being necessarily so different; payment by
results and promotion or dismissal according to the will of the
employer being inapplicable if not impossible under the State."[210]
The Committee's report covers nineteen pages, but only these two
paragraphs are in answer to the reference given to the Committee. In
them the Committee reports its failure; and with that report of failure
the Committee should have contented itself, under all of the rules
of procedure governing Committees and Commissions appointed by the
British Government. But the Committee ignored the established rules of
procedure, roamed about at will, and reopened many of the questions
settled by the Tweedmouth Committee, which had sat two years, and had
taken upward of a thousand closely printed folio pages of evidence.
The Bradford Committee did this in violation of the established usage
of the country, as well as in spite of the fact that Mr. Austen
Chamberlain, Postmaster General, had closed the speech in which he
announced his resolve to appoint the Committee, with the words that he
wanted advice on the question of comparative wages only and that he
refused to transfer to "any Committee the duty of regulating in all its
details the daily administration and work of the Post Office."
Upon the Report of the Committee, _The Economist_[211] (London)
commented as follows: "This Committee was asked to compare the wages
of Post Office servants with those paid for corresponding work
outside. Their answer was, in effect, that no such comparison could
be instituted. Why, when postal servants are taken from various
ascertained classes [of society], it should be impossible to compare
their pay with that ordinarily received by the same classes in other
employments is not obvious. What is obvious is that the Committee
either mistook the inquiry entrusted to them, or did not choose to
enter upon it."
_The Times_[212] said: "The reference here is explicit, ...
The specific question they were asked was the question to which, as
our Correspondent says, the taxpayer really wants an answer--namely,
are postal servants fairly paid ...? This question the Committee has
neither answered nor attempted to answer. Passing by the terms of
reference altogether, the Report declares that 'it is difficult'....
But, as an answer to the specific question addressed to the Committee;
it is, in our judgment, in the literal sense of the word, impertinent.
However, having rejected the criterion propounded to them by the
Postmaster General, the Committee proposed to apply a criterion of
their own...." The Committee made some general statements as to the
rates of wages that should prevail in the public service. They were:
"We think that Postal employees are justified in resting their claims
to remuneration on the responsible and exacting[213] character of the
duties performed and on the social position they fill as servants of
the State. The State, for its part, does right in taking an independent
course guided by principles of its own, irrespective of what others may
do; neither following an example nor pretending to set one. It must
always be remembered that in the working of a monopoly by the State,
the interest of the public as a whole is the paramount consideration,
and every economy consistent with efficiency must be adopted. The terms
offered by the State should, however, be such as to secure men and
women of the requisite character and capacity and ought to be such as
will insure the response of hearty service." If one seeks to find in
the foregoing statements an answer to the very matter-of-fact question
whether the postal servants' wages are too high or too low, compared
with wages in outside employment, he will have to conclude, with _Alice
in Wonderland_, that "it seems very pretty, but it's rather hard to
understand; somehow it seems to fill my head with ideas, only I don't
know exactly what they are."
The Committee concluded with the statement that the adequacy of the
wages obtaining among the postal employees could be tested by the
numbers and character of those who offered themselves; by the capacity
they showed on trial; and finally, by their contentment. It found that
there was no lack of suitable candidates; that there was no complaint
as to their capacity; but that there was widespread discontent. It
added that the Tweedmouth and Norfolk-Hanbury settlements did not
give satisfaction at the time; and that that dissatisfaction had been
"aggravated by the general rise in wages and prices and in the standard
of life which took place to some extent even during the two years
occupied by the Tweedmouth inquiry (1895 and 1896) and had continued
since, culminating, however, in 1900, since when there has been some
slight reaction. The same period has seen a great development of Postal
and Telegraph business, causing greater pressure of work. This has been
combined with lower charges to the public and a considerable increase
in Postal Revenue. We therefore consider there is a just claim for
revision."
Taking these statements in their order, one finds, first of all,
that the Committee took no evidence on the question how Post Office
wages had compared with wages in outside employment previous to the
rise in wages and prices in the period from 1895 to 1900, nor on the
question of the rise in wages in the Post Office Service in 1896
to 1900, compared with the rise in wages in outside employment and
in prices in 1895 to 1900. The first statement of the Committee,
therefore, was supported by no evidence, it was a mere assertion. The
second statement, namely, that the growth of the Postal and Telegraph
business had caused greater pressure of work, also was not supported
by evidence. On the other hand, it was absolutely essential that such
a statement should be supported by evidence, because it is a fact that
in both branches of the Postal Service the policy obtains of having so
large a body of employees "that the maximum of work, as a rule, can be
dealt with without undue pressure."[214] As to the Post Office having
lowered its charges to the public in the period from 1895 to 1900, it
is to be said, first, that it does not follow therefrom that wages
should be raised; and second, that the penny rate on domestic letters
was not lowered, and that the carriage of penny letters is the only
work upon which the Post Office makes a profit.[215] Finally, as to
the statement that there had been, in 1895 to 1904, "a considerable
increase in Postal Revenue," the facts are, first, that the net
revenue of the Post Office as a whole increased from $14,640,000 in
1895, to $18,166,000 in 1896, and to $18,781,000 in 1897; but that
in the subsequent years, 1898 to 1904, it did not again reach the
high-water mark of 1897, and averaged $17,642,000. Second, that in the
period, from 1895 to 1904, the Telegraph Branch did not earn operating
expenses, the expenses on account of wages and salaries having risen
from 11.9 cents per telegram in 1897, to 13.7 cents in 1904. That is a
matter of importance, for the recommendations of the Committee extended
to the Telegraph Branch as well as to the Postal Branch proper.
Again, the Committee had stated that "in the working of a monopoly
by the State, the interest of the public as a whole is the paramount
consideration, and every economy consistent with efficiency must be
adopted." In the 20 years ending with 1903, the proportion of the Post
Office's gross revenue available for defraying the general expenses of
the State had declined steadily from 33 per cent. to 20 per cent.[216]
Still, again, in the year 1903, the expenses of the Post Office had
been increased by $3,000,000 through the Tweedmouth and Norfolk-Hanbury
settlements.[217] In the face of those facts, the Bradford Committee
made recommendations that Lord Stanley, Postmaster General, said
would cost $6,500,000 a year.[218] The Bradford Committee sought to
justify its recommendations with the simple statement that there
was "widespread discontent" among the Postal employees. The Postal
employees themselves had made demands before the Committee that would
have called for the expenditure of an additional $12,500,000 a year.
Their attitude to the Committee's amiable proposal to conciliate them
by giving them $6,500,000 a year, is shown in the subjoined extract
from the official organ of the telegraph staff. "It is perfectly plain,
... that the recommendations of the Committee, well-meaning as we
frankly admit them to be, cannot be accepted as a full settlement of
the case of the Post Office workers, or as one carrying with it the
character of finality. They can only be accepted as an instalment of a
long overdue account; and Postal Telegraphists, even if they have to
fight alone for their own hand in the future as they did for many long
years in the past, will combine for the payment of the balance."[219]
That a body of five men, of whom four were respectively a Liverpool
merchant and ship owner, a general manager of a railway, a manager
of a large wholesale coöperative society, and a manager of a large
department store, could make a Report such as the foregoing one,
affords a melancholy illustration of the fact that no matter how far
popular governments may go in assuming the conduct of great business
enterprises, they never will succeed in creating a public opinion that
will sustain them in their efforts to conduct their business ventures
on the commonly accepted principles of the business world.
* * * * *
In the House of Commons, Lord Stanley, the Postmaster General,
said: "As to the Committee's Report, it did not comply with the
reference, because no comparison was made with the rates of pay in
other occupations ... but they conclude that as there was discontent
there ought to be an increase of wages. That was a direct premium
on discontent, a direct encouragement to the employees to say among
themselves that if they were to be discontented and to agitate, they
would get more in the future. The Committee, on the other hand, went
outside the reference, because they proposed a complete reorganization
of the Post Office, including overseers, who were not referred to in
the reference. On this particular subject they took no evidence....
Since the employees of the Post Office had said in a circular: 'We
wish to make it perfectly clear that we do not regard the Committee
as in any sense an arbitration board,' that was rather against the
argument that the Report ought to be accepted as an arbitration award.
He did not complain of the ordinary circulars of the employees [sent
to Members of Parliament], but he did object to one circular [sent to
every Member of the House of Commons], at the bottom of which was a
paragraph, which could be torn off, for Members to sign [and mail to
the Postmaster General], informing him [the Postmaster General] that
he ought to do this or that.[220] That [circular] he [Lord Stanley]
would not receive.... Coming to the main question, he thought it was
obvious that it was impossible for either side when in power to go on
for long being swayed in all these questions of increases of wages by
any pressure, political or otherwise, that might be put upon them.
[Cheers.] The Post Office was not the only party concerned. There was
not a class employed by the Government, who, if it saw another class
getting an increase of wages by agitation, would not try the same
method. He supported cordially the suggestion which had been made in
the debate that all questions of pay of employees of the Government
should not be referred to the House, but referred to some judicial body
on whom no outside influence could be brought to bear, who would look
at the matter in dispute as between employer and employee with the
object of giving to the employee the wages which in the open market
a good employer would give, while at the same time protecting the
master--in this case the State--from any outside influence."[221] In
conclusion, Lord Stanley made the statement that the adoption of the
Committee's Report would cost "well over $5,000,000 a year."
Sir Albert Rollit acted as the spokesman of the Postal employees. He
is a Solicitor in Mincing Lane and at Hull; a steamship owner at Hull,
Newcastle and London; and a Director in the National Telephone Company,
which pays its employees materially less than the Post Office pays
the employees of the Post Office Telephone system.[222] He has been
President of the Associated Chambers of Commerce of the United Kingdom,
as well as of the London and Hull Chambers of Commerce. He was Mayor
of Hull from 1883 to 1885; and for several years past he has been the
President of the Association of Municipal Corporations. Sir Albert
K. Rollit was not re-elected to Parliament in the General Election
of January, 1906; and in the following March, the Postal Telegraph
Clerks' Association passed a resolution "expressing appreciation of
the services rendered to the Postal movement in and out of Parliament
by Sir Albert K. Rollit, and regret that they were no longer able to
command his championship in the House of Commons."[223]
After the Balfour Government had rejected the Report of the Bradford
Committee, in the interest of the taxpayers, Lord Stanley, Postmaster
General, instituted "a careful comparison between Post Office
wages and those current in other employments; and, as the result
of the comparison, he felt justified in recommending to the Lords
Commissioners of His Majesty's Treasury certain improvements of pay"
aggregating $1,861,500 a year.[224] The improvements of pay were
granted to sorters, telegraphists, sorting clerks and telegraphists,
postmen, assistant and auxiliary postmen, and various smaller classes
throughout the United Kingdom.
FOOTNOTES:
[209] There was no reference but that one.
[210] _Report and Appendices of the Committee appointed to inquire into
Post Office Wages_, 1904.
[211] September 17, 1904.
[212] September 12, 1904.
[213] _Report of the Bradford Committee on Post Office Wages_, 1904, p.
198.
Dr. A. H. Wilson, Chief Medical Officer of the Post Office, testified:
"When cases of breakdown have been brought to my notice I have
invariably found the primary origin of the illness to have been due
to causes outside Post Office life. These causes are generally drink,
financial worry, domestic troubles, etc."
[214] Compare Chapter XI, testimony of Mr. Kerry.
[215] _Hansard's Parliamentary Debates_, April 27, 1900, pp. 229 and
136; Mr. R. W. Hanbury, Financial Secretary to the Treasury.
[216] _Hansard's Parliamentary Debates_, May 11, p. 342; Mr. Austen
Chamberlain, Postmaster General.
[217] _Hansard's Parliamentary Debates_, April 20, 1903, p. 1,022; Mr.
Austen Chamberlain, Postmaster General.
[218] _Hansard's Parliamentary Debates_, July 6, 1905, p. 1,390; Lord
Stanley.
[219] _The Times_, September 17, 1904: Correspondence.
[220] _The Times_, September 12, 1904, denominated this episode "a
melancholy and even ominous illustration of the process of democratic
degeneration." In the same issue Mr. S. W. Belderson writes that 130
Members of the House signed the paragraph in question.
[221] _The Times_, August 10, 1904.
[222] _Report of the Inter-Departmental Committee on Post Office
Establishments_, 1897; q. 13,804; Mr. S. Walpole, Permanent Secretary
of the Post Office.
[223] _The Times_, March 17, 1906; and _Who's Who_, 1905.
[224] _Fifty-first Report of the Postmaster General_, 1905.