The Labour Movement first started in Great Britain which was the first country to industrialize. As a result of industrialization large number of workers were concentrated in the factory towns.

These works formed associations which tried to secure the enforcement of labour laws passed by the government for the protection of the workers. These early associations cannot be equated with the trade unions because they never engaged in collective bargaining with the employers.

Even then the attitude of the government towards these associations was not favourable because they were usurping functions which belonged to the government. Therefore, the government passed a number of statutes dissolving various trade unions. In 1799 and 1800 the government enacted Combination Laws, a general stat­ute against the trade unionism.

The trade unions were banned and the workers who joined a trade union or took part in strike were subjected to summary trial. The Combination Laws of 1799 and 1800 were strictly enforced and heavy sentences were inflicted on trade unionists. As a result of the harsh policy of the government the trade union movement went underground.

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The trade unions continued to be illegal till 1824 when Francis Place, with the help of radical members of House of Commons, succeeded in getting a Bill passed by the Parliament by which the trade union were recognized as lawful bodies, and exempted from the common law of con­spiracy.

Soon after the enactment of this law the workmen resorted to strikes and the entire country was convulsed with industrial disputes. As a result there was once again a demand from shipping interests to re-enact Combination Laws. This culminated in an amending Act in 1825 which deprived the trade unions of the exemption from the law of conspiracy conferred on them by the Act of 1824. This gave a serious set back to the labour movement because the government could crush the workers when­ever they announced their intention to go on strike by treating the strike as evidence of a conspiracy.

Despite the various disabilities from which the trade unions suffered, they continued to entertain the idea of creating a vast industrial union embracing all workers. This idea found a concrete shape in the shape of Grand National Consolidated Trades Union in 1834. This trade union con­tained both industrial as well as agricultural workers as members.

In view of the heterogeneous character of the Grand National Consolidated Trade Union could not adopt any common policy and take any concerted action. It merely succeeded in organizing a series of local strikes which were badly suppressed. As a result, soon the Grand National Consolidated Trade Union went out of existence.

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With the disappearance of the Grand National the trade union movement in England did not die. Soon workers turned their support the Chartist Movement and demanded numerous measures for the improvement of lot of workers. In the meanwhile the trade union movement also continued to make steady progress and in 1850 about half a dozen of small engineering class combinations merged themselves to form the Amalgamated Society of Engineers. This organization accumulated large funds through heavy sub­scriptions from members and tried to provide assistance to the sick and unemployed members.

Soon the Amalgamated Society of Engineers (ASE) emerged as a model for the workers of various industries and occupation and similar societies were formed by workers in other occupations. These trade unions did not favour strikes and tried to achieve their objectives through friendly negotiations or legal enactments.

Gradually the trade union movement in Britain got consolidated. However in mid sixties the trade union move­ment suffered a set back on account of two developments. First, there was outburst of public indignation against trade unions of account of use of violence by the trade unionists against the non-unionists at Sheffield and a virulent campaign against trade unionism was started in press.

Secondly, in 1867 the court in the case of Hornby vs. Close declared that the trade unions could not avail themselves of the privileges of friendly societies and thus deprived them of protection for their funds. Under the circumstances the government decided to set up a Commission to look into the working of the trade unions. The Commission in its report asserted that majority of the trade unions were peaceful and law-abiding bodies and the Sheffield outrages were only an exception^ The Commission did not favour revival of Combination Laws.

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In the light of the recommendations of the Commission the govern­ment passed the Trade Union Act 1871. However, simultaneously it also passed a Criminal Law Amendment Act by which the scope of law of conspiracy was extended to trade unions.

There were strong protests from the trade union leaders against the Criminal Law Amendment Act and ultimately the government decided to replace it by the Conspiracy and Protection of Property Act, which greatly restricted the application of the law of conspiracy in industrial disputes. As a- result most of the restric­tions on the working of the trade union were done away with and hence­forth they could make effective use of the weapon of strike.

In the meanwhile between 1830-60 the principle of ‘collective bargaining’ was gradually recognized in Britain. In 1860 the Nottingham Hosiery Trade established a conciliation board consisting of equal number of representatives of each side.

If the board could not reach an agreement an arbitrator was called in. Some district and factory sub-committees were also set up which settled most of the matters without bothering the central board. During the discussion the work was to continue undis­turbed. But in the final resort if the arbitrators’ award was unsatisfactory to either side, a strike or a lockout was permissible.

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The Nottingham Plan was widely copied by the oth.er industrial estab­lishments and they established a permanent machinery and evolved methods of procedure for resolving the disputes. Under the Acts of 1896 and 1908 the Board of Trade was given power to arbitrate or appoint a conciliation board if asked to do so by the conflicting parties–or even mediate between the disputants if it saw reasonable prospects of bringing the quarrel to an end.

The labour movement in Britain assumed a new dimension when the unskilled workers were brought within the ambit of trade union movement in eighties of the nineteenth century. In this regard John Burns, Tom Mann and Ben Tillett played an important role. They criticized the earlier unions for their timidity and failure to take aggressive action against em­ployers and indicated their determination to form new type of fighting bodies with low subscription rates to rope in all the unskilled workers.

They organized a number of strikes among the unskilled workers including the famous London Dock Strike of 1889, which received wide public support. A large number of general labour unions were formed and more and more workers were brought within the ambit of trade unionism.

With the dawn of the twentieth century the labour movement in Britain suffered a serious set back. In 1901 the Taff Vale Railway Company brought a suit against the Railwaymen’s Union for damages due to their strike. The court decided the case in favour of the company and the union was required to pay Pound 23,000 as damages. This evoked strong pro­tests from workers and they launched an agitation to demand legislation for undoing the damage done by the court’s decision. This resulted in the enactment of the Trades Disputes Act in 1906 which stated in unmistak­able terms that trade unions could not be sued in courts of law. In 1909 the courts forbade the trade unions from imposing political levy on its members in the Osborne Case. Once again relief was provided to trade unions by the Parliament which enacted an Act in 1913 by which political levies were authorized.

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The formation of the Labour Party in 1906 by the merger of various socialist bodies and Trade Union Congresses provided a new direction to the labour movement in Britain.

The Labour Party took part in elections and captured 29 seats in the House of Commons in 1906. It further increased its strength to 42 in the elections of 1910. In the Parliament the

Labour Party members extended full support to various social laws spon­sored by the Liberal Government and succeeded in getting a number of laws passed. These laws related to payment of salaries to MPs, introduc­tion of insurance schemes and old age pension etc., improvement in workmen’s compensation; eight hours day for miners; minimum wages; establishment of trade boards to eliminate sweating; abolition of night work for women in industry.

However, all these efforts failed to satisfy the workers and they were greatly disillusioned with the high prices and began to feel like the French that economic ends must be sought by industrial means viz. through strikes. As a result, between 1910 and 1913 there was an outburst of strikes. As a result of these strikes the workers succeeded in getting a considerable raise in their wages and the Parliament passed law for minimum wages for miners.

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During the First World War the labour movement in Britain suffered a set back. Under Munitions Act of 1915 compulsory arbitration was intro­duced and right to strike was taken away. In fact all the trade union rules which hampered the production were suspended. With the end of war, once again there was an enormous increase in trade union activities. The membership of trade unions almost doubled in 1920 over membership in 1913. There were a number of strikes for higher wages.

The process of amalgamation of various unions also started and a number of federations of unions were formed. Demand was also raised for the formation of ‘one big unions’ which could use general strike as a weapon for coercing the employers. In 1926 a country-wide general strike was organized by the trade union congress in support of the miners, but it proved to be a great failure.

However, the strike demonstrated that the workers were willings to render blind obedience to their leaders. This general strike also led to the enactment of the Trade Union Act of 1927 which declared general strike illegal.

Despite the above set-back it cannot be denied that during twenties and thirties the labour movement in Britain grew in strength and collective bargaining was widely resorted to in various fields. It has been pointed out that in 1931 the earnings of about 8,000,000 workers were determined by collective bargaining or by the state. In the subsequent years the wages of the workers were considerably increased and the gap between the best- paid workers and worst-paid workers was greatly narrowed.