A LABOUR PROGRAMME.
MANY people are rejoicing over the folly and fatuity of the resolutions passed by the Independent Labour party at the recent Conference. The wildness, nay, wantonness, of their proposals is taken to be a sign that the whole movement may be laughed out of Court as utterly unpracticable, and so not worth a moment's thought. That is by no means our feeling. We are quite willing to admit that there is nothing in the Independent Labour party, and that their programme is doomed to hopeless failure, but that does not make us take any more delight in it. We cannot profess to find any pleasure in seeing a considerable section of English working meu making fools of themselves. As our readers know, we have always expressed sympathy with the Labour leaders, and though we may have disagreed with their particular aims and projects, we have always held that they ought to be considered as fully and fairly, and with as much care, as those put forth by any other political chiefs. It is, therefore, extremely disappointing to find a labour programme which, with the best will in the world, it is impossible to treat seriously. One may consider and discuss or controvert a coherent set of ideas, however extreme and revolutionary, but how can one discuss a set of proposals which are mutually destructive,—proposals which could do neither harm nor good because they could never be carried into effect ?
Consider for a moment what is asked by the Independent Labour party. They begin by declaring that "the true object of industry being the production of the require- ments of life, the responsibility should rest with the community collectively." They go on to advocate the nationalisation of the land, and to declare that "the capital necessary for industrial operations should be owned and used collectively." Work and the wealth resulting therefrom are to be equitably distributed over the population, though how this distribution is to take place is not stated. As a means to this end, the enactment of the following measures is demanded :—" (1) A maximum eight-hour working day and six-day week, with the reten- tion of all the existing holidays and Labour Day, May 1st, secured by law. (2) The provision of work to all capable adult applicants at recognised Trade-Union rates with a statutory minimum of 6d. per hour. In order to remu- neratively employ the applicants, Parish, District, Borough, and County Councils to be invested with powers to (a) organise and undertake such industries as they may con- sider desirable ; (b) compulsorily acquire land, purchase, erect, or manufacture buildings, machinery, stock, or other articles for carrying on such industries ; (c) levy rates on the rental values of the district and borrow money on the security of such rates for any of the above purposes. (3) State pensions for every person over fifty years of age and adequate provision for all widows, orphans, sick and disabled workers. (4) Free maintenance of children while at school or University ; free primary, secondary, and University secular education. (5) The raising of the age of child labour with a view to its ultimate abolition. (6) Abolition of indirect taxation, and the gradual trans- ference of all public burdens on to unearned incomes, with a view to their ultimate extinction ; municipalisation and popular control of the liquor traffic." The Independent Labour party is finally declared to be in favour of every proposal for extending electoral rights to both men and women and for democratising the system of government.
We have quoted the greater part of these proposals verbatim to show that we are not travestying the party's programme. Let us ask for a moment how these things are to be carried out, and what would be their effect ? In the first place, it is clear that the Independent Labour party's Chancellor of the Exchequer will want very large funds. Just imagine what a sum will be re- quired in order to provide pensions for all persons over fifty years of age, and also provision for all widows, orphans, sick and disabled workers. These persons cannot together number less than ten millions at the present moment in the United Kingdom. But no member of the Independent Labour party will wish to give them less than 12s. a week each, or say .230 a year. Therefore the pensions and the sick, orphans', and widows' relief budget will be £300,000,000 a year. In addition to this the localities are to find work for all the men who wish to work. Now we cannot rightly assume that all this public work will be remunerative, that is, that the localities will get their money's worth when they pay the minimum of 24s. a week. Still, for the purpose of argument let us assume that the localities will always find remunerative work for the labourers, and will not be obliged to borrow money on the rates,—a not too easy operation, by the way, considering that unearned incomes are to be taxed out of existence, and with them, of course, all incomes from loans. As to the next item which the Chancellor of the Exchequer will have to provide, there can be no doubt. He is to find not only free primary, secondary, and University education for all children, but also free maintenance for all children while at school and college. This is apparently to apply to girls as well as boys. But as they are to have a University education, we presume that this must mean that all children between the ages of four and twenty are to be at the charge of the State. i But f "free maintenance" is to mean clothes and books and maps and spectacles and a hundred other items, ag well as house, food, and fire, the child will be sure to average 220 a year in board and tuition. But this must mean at least another .2100,000,000 a year. The Chan- e,ellor of the Exchequer, then, will want to raise. .2400,000,000 a year, besides such sums as he require to grant to the Army and Navy to enable their to protect the State from Continental "despots," who cannot be expected to look on the changes with much favour. We need not, however, estimate what this wig` cost ; nor, again, how much is to be allowed for Judges, police, payment of Members of Parliament and local Councils, &c. Let us assume that all this, as well as the Army and Navy, can be got for nothing, and consider that the Chancellor of the Exchequer need only apply his mind to raising some £400,000,000 a year. How is he to get it ? Not from indirect taxes, because by Clause 6 of the programme these are to be abolished entirely, save, we presume, as regards alcoholic drinks, while imposts are apparently to be dealt with by the local authorities, who are to regulate the liquor traffic. "All publ'c burdens are," says Clause 6 of the programme, "to be gradually transferred on to unearned incomes." This means, we presume, that the incomes of the doctor, the artist, the lawyer—the private man of business, with the nationalisation of all industries, will have ceased to exist —are to escape altogether, but that the holder of invest- ments is to feel the whole weight of taxation. At preset t the so-called unearned incomes belong to the owners (1 land and ground-rents, to the possessors of stocks of various kinds, to the debenture-holders in various companies—the possessor of ordinary railway stock is generally supposed to be earning his dividend in trade, and so his income is not unearned—and to the money- lender or mortgagee. But since the land will have become national property, the landowner, the ground-rent proprietor, and the mortgagee will have disappeared. So will most debenture-holders, and indeed all the shareholders in all the industrial and trading companies, including, of course, the railway companies. There will therefore remain only the possessors of Government and local stocks, the holders of foreign securities, and possibly the debenture-holders in a few companies, like, say, theatre and music-hall companies, which have escaped nationalisa- tion. But can any one suppose that these "unearned incomes" will be able to bear the collection from them of £400,000,000 a year ? Probably even when taxed at the rate of 20s. in the pound they would not produce half that sum. But the authors of the Independent Labour party programme may reply, That is just what we want. The unearned incomes will have disappeared, and we shall have obtained one of our chief objects.' No doubt ; and this might do very well if the State could simply forfeit the unearned incomes. But the moment the State takes 20s. in the pound a great many of the un- earned incomes begin to disappear. The so-called un- earned income as often as not depends upon certain acts of the receiver for its continued existence. But depend upon it no one will do anything to get an income which will go not to him but to the State. Hence it is utterly absurd to suppose that the State will ever be able to raise £400,000,000 a year, even by confiscating all un- earned incomes. In fact, the Independent Labour party have arranged for spending the golden eggs year by year on the assumption that they will never fail, and at the same time propose to kill the goose as a public nuisance. Depend upon it, nothing substantial was ever built upon a foundation of paradox such as this.
But it is really waste of breath and ink to discuss any- thing so preposterous as the Independent Labour party's programme. As one reads it, however, one is sometimes tempted to ask how it is that the Labour party in England does not throw up a real leader ? How is it that our regular parties are not confronted with some strong- headed, clear-eyed demagogue of the old type capable of making a programme which, if extreme, should at any rate be based on common-sense,—the common-sense of plunder, if you will, but at any rate on something which is not nonsense ? We believe the answer to be one which is both simple and satisfactory. We do not get the dema- gogue suggesting plunder plain and simple—a ten-shilling Income-tax,for example, and the repudiation of the National Debt—because the majority of the working classes would hate and denounce any such proposal quite as keenly as the well-to-do classes. The majority of the working men do not feel themselves separated from their fellow men and placed in a water-tight compartment marked " Lalsair." Their political instincts are no more purely sectional than those of stockbrokers or tea-merchants. This is the reason why the Independent Labour party is so little supported by the genuine labourer. The Inde- pendent Labour party is a small party of poor men who are also faddists. There is nothing in their organisation which specially attracts the artisan, and such strength as they have comes rather from a sort of crypto-jealousy and dislike of the legitimate labour organisations than from any internal power. The Independent Labour party is thus altogether a negligeable quantity, and much more a subject for our pity than our anger. It is, however, as we have said above, a real subject for regret to see any body of Englishmen talking such mere nonsense.
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