The engineering employers on Saturday last decided to give a
week's notice to the semi-skilled and unskilled men belonging to the forty-seven unions other than the Amalgamated Engin- eering Union, which includes the skilled men who were locked out a month ago. The forty-seven unions had definitely refused to recede from their demand that an employer should give ten days' notice, to the union of any and every change in his methods that might be construed as " material change." The employers were willing • to discuss " material changes " with the unions, but they -wanted to guard themselves against the possibility that any new instruction by a foreman might cause the work in a shop to be suspended for days while the union delegates and shop stewards argued about it. The completion of contracts by a given date would thus become impossible, and employers would cease to have any real control over their own business. It is none the less regrettable that the controversy over these abstract principles should lead to the locking out of perhaps 300,000 more men. There is far too much unempoyment already.
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