The Engineering Employers' Federation declared on Saturday last a lock-out
of members of the Amalgamated Engineering Union. All the efforts of conciliators had failed, largely because the Union Executive had been thrown over by the men in their recent ballot and did not feel sure of its ground. The union has 400,000 members. Many were out of work and a large number were in the service of firms outside tho Federation, but it is estimated that 250,000 skilled engineers were thrown idle—to increase the vast army of the unemployed. The Employers' Federation stated that the issue was not overtime, but "the refusal by the trade unions to continue the recognition of the employer's right to exercise managerial functions in his establishment unless with the consent and approval of the Unions," as for example in regard to the working of new machine- tools. The Union, on the other hand, asserted that it did not challenge the right of employers to exercise managerial functions in regard to overtime, provided that the time worked did not exceed thirty hours a month. But it resisted the employers' claim to employ unskilled men on "skilled work entirely at their discretion without consultation with the union."
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