Edition Bobbett1. Texts by Elizabeth F. Bobbett: 1.2.1. Published Texts, Articles in yearbooks and anthologies

1949 Elizabeth Bobbett: Apropos of the foregoing article

Source: Christus Rex. An Irish Quarterly Journal of Sociology, Vol. III, 1949, p. 36-38

The Rev. Dr. Morris, in his Paper, has certainly gone very deeply into the history of Rural Trade Union organisation. From my own experience I am in agreement with him that Rural Workers and Farmers are more difficult to organise than other sections of the community. Speaking from the Farmers’ standpoint, I agree too that the welfare of Agriculture depends on our being effectively organised and having at the same time the closest co-operation between the farmer and his worker.

International statistics show that Agriculture is by far the largest industry in the world, taking into account the number of persons engaged in it; and the most important from the point of view of what it produces as well. Surely then it merits a form of organisation made-to-measure rather than one taken ready-made from the factory and the office. Besides, Agriculture to the Irish people is more than just another ‘industry’: it is a way of life. Nor can it well be regulated like the other industries; it depends too much on Divine providence, the success or failure of crops, on weather, losses of animals through epidemics or disease (not always preventable), etc. So in arriving at what is the just price for farm produce, for instance, we have to allow a larger percentage of profit on each item than the industrial percentage of profit - to offset the loss on other items.

Similarly hours and conditions of work will have to be different from those in industry. To begin with, when Ireland fed double the population we have to-day, her farmers and agricultural workers worked up to 70 and 80 hours a week. Our greatest output was and is livestock and livestock products. If however we are to increase these, it can be done only by greater care and attention to feeding and management, particularly in dairying, stall-feeding, pig production and calf-rearing. But this cannot be fitted into an eight-hour day and a five-and-a-half day week. If then the hours of agricultural workers are ruled by the Agricultural Wages Board to be 50 a week, the farmer will follow some other line like grain growing or dry-stock raising, and do with less hired labour. This will be disastrous both for dairying, etc., and for employment.

When the advocates of Labour appeal to the high cost of living to support their demands for still higher wages, they never realise that the granting of their demands is a direct cause of the high cost of living, as most industries have their prices and profits fixed after taking into account all costs of production including wages. Only when it comes to fixing agricultural prices and wages does this not happen - unfortunately for the farmer. Here is where agriculture has been neglected. I may add that the Irish Farmers’ Federation has for several years been pressing the Department of Agriculture to set up a Costing Tribunal to investigate the costs of production in agriculture, so that fair prices, based on these costings and allowing for a fair wage to those engaged in agriculture, could be fixed. We would welcome a Workers’ Union making a similar demand.

Agricultural workers should be paid as well as, if not actually better than, workers in industry, but in order to do this the farmer must get prices that will enable him to meet this extra charge. This he is not, and has not been, getting. It must be remembered, that farmers from 1930 to 1937 were getting prices almost 20 per cent below the 1914 level, while the Cost of Living during those years was around 50 per cent higher than the 1914 figure. In 1938-1939, the years on which the Agricultural Price Index is based, the Cost of Living was 74 per cent higher than for 1914, whereas the Agricultural Price Index was only 11 per cent higher than in 1914. In 1945 the Cost of Living figure had reached 295 compared with 1914, whereas agricultural prices had reached only to 180. The rise in the Cost of Living was mainly due to the rise in manufactured and imported commodities; if the figure was 295 and agricultural produce increased only to 180, then the other items must have increased to something like 400.

In years gone by this country was fed on cheap food produced by the unpaid labour of the farmers’ family, as only about 50,000 out of our 250,112 farmers pay hired labour. Since high wages can be earned in so many industries, is it any wonder that many thousands of our young people have left the land? If we are to stop this flight from the land, the farmer must be assured of better prices for his output so that his family can get a fair share in return for their labours on the land. I am not against cheap food. I am only against cheap food and dear industrial goods and services, this weighting of the balance against agriculture.

This brings us to the point as to the most suitable organisation for rural workers. I suggest that it must be one that demands first and foremost a guaranteed price for farmers based on costs of production which include fair wages to all workers.

The suggestion of reducing the work to 50 hours a week or 5½ days is definitely a city suggestion and not practical on the farm. It will mean just an extra rise in wages, where instead of taking the half day the man works on and is paid overtime for his half day.

With regard to holidays the agricultural worker has the advantage over the city worker in that he gets all the Church Holidays free, and that it is usual for him to get days throughout the year as well for the purpose of attending fairs to sell his pigs or cow, or to attend ploughing matches or funerals, not to mention the hours off to cultivate his plot - with the use of horses and machinery from his employer. Long may these human associations last and keep him from being turned into just another cog in the machine.

The rise in wages granted by the Agricultural Wages Board means more to farmers in increased cost of production than at first meets the eye, as we know that once the farm worker gets a rise in pay, the County Council and Forestry workers also get an increase in pay, all of which comes out of the farmers’ pocket in the form of increased rates and taxes.

It seems that there is a tendency on the part of those organising rural workers to view agricultural problems too much from the urban or industrial standard. This may seem to the great advantage to the rural worker, but in reality it may mean a large number of rural workers losing permanent employment and mixed farming becoming more mechanised. The great argument against shortening hours and increasing wages is that present Agricultural Prices are insufficient to meet the higher costs, and also that it will seriously retard output to the national loss.

It would therefore be in the best interests of the Agricultural workers themselves that they form an organisation confined exclusively to, and directed wholly by agricultural workers who understand and appreciate the needs of the industry. Secondly it would be to the best interests of workers and farmers to make common cause to secure for the agricultural worker permanent employment at a just wage and for the farmer just prices so that he can pay the wage. This raising of the standard of living of both those important sections in our national economy would, of course, be in the best interest of the country as well.