All-Russian Union of Treasury Employees

by Central Committee of the All-Russian Trade Union of Treasury Employees

Russian Socialist Federal Soviet Republic.

Workers of the World, Unite!

 

ALL-RUSSIAN UNION OF
TREASURY EMPLOYEES.

 

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Published by the All-Russian Central Council of Trade
Unions.

Moscow.—1920.

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Printing Works of the III International.

Union of Treasury Employees.

1. The Organisation and the General Character
of the Union’s work.

The „All-Russian Union of Treasury Employees“ unites all the workers employed in financial departments of Russia's economic activities and also the persons employed in various control institutions. The development of the Union's scheme of organisation has been following the change in the structure of the particular branches of activities themselves.

First attempts to organise Treasury Employees have been made in 1905 when a revolutionary wave had brought to the forefront of public life the dormant tendency of Russian Labour to find their own mind, and to organize themselves. At that time, here and there sprang up rudimentary, loosely-knit organisations of employees who had neither clearly defined class-consciouness nor comprehension of the method of class-war. These attempts have however, been soon repressed by political reaction taking an upper hand, and for a long time the class-conscious trade union movement of Russian Workpeople was dead.

It was only the March revolution that brought back to life the oppressed Russian Workers—and the Treasury Employees reappeared simultaneously on the stage of Russia's political life, and took their place within the ranks of the Labour Movement generally.

For some time the Treasury Employees' organisations have been bearing strong marks of craft conceptions of trade-unionism. Employees engaged in private undertakings of a financial nature tried to build up an organisation separate from the line organisations of Civil Servants, employed in public financial institutions, and the same separatist tendency dominates. the Government Employees' Movement. The „All-Russian Union of Employees in private and credit institutions“, organised in May 1917, tried to combine all the workers, employed in Commercial Banks, Land Banks, Banking Houses, Exchange Offices, Societies for Mutual Credit, Credit Cooperative organisations and Public Pawn-shops. Employees, working in Government financial departments have built up not a single, but many unions—as many as there were separate departments in the Ministry of Finance,—namely one for Treasury and its branch offices, one for excisemen, one for tax-collections inspecting staff, one for custom officers, one for Saving Banks.

Employees, one for Employees of the State Bank & of provincial branches, one for Employees of the Granary Elevator Department. In just the same manner the Sate Staff of the „State Control“ has been keeping aloof and preferred to build up its own union.

Such was the general picture of the movement among the Employees up till the time of the November Revolution.

The latter added a new impetus to the tendency of treasury Employees to organise themselves, but this time on the lines of industry. Nationalisation of private Banks, closing up of the Societies for Mutual Credit and various Land Banks, incorporation of Municipal Banks, with a single „People's Bank of the Republic“ made it necessary for the workers employed in these institutions to reconstruct their various unions in accordance with the new organisation of financial business. This reconstruction has been finished by May 1918 when a „Union of Banks and Credit Institutions Employees“ was formed. The new Union, after Treasury was incorporated with the People's Bank and became the organisation of Treasury Saving Bank and Granaries of Elevators' Employees as well. All this was confirmed by a congress convened in January 1919.

Nearly all the same time the tax collecting departments Excise offices and the inspecting staff were incorporated with the financial departments of local Soviets. This reorganisation made way for organisation of a Union of Finance Workers and Tax-Collectors, to which the Custom officials and later the workers in various control institutions also affiliated. Further reorganisation of financial machinery of the Republic has brought with it the abolition of the National Bank's Central Board of Directors and its substitution by a Central Management for Budget Drafting and accountancy, and the definite centralisation of finance Departments which are now managing the operations of the former National Bank. This again served to bring both Unions to the recognition of the necessity for amalgamation into a Treasury Employees' Union. A special Congress of delegates which is to meet in May 1920 will definitely decide upon the question of the particular form to amalgamation.

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At present every one working in Finance and Control Institutions of the Soviet Republic—without distinction of position, from a porter to a director, is a member of the Union. Exempted are only the persons politically responsible for direction if they are elected to their post by proper Soviet organs.

As regards the general structure of the Union only two questions are not yet definitely settled—namely the question whether it is proper to include into the Union the workers of Labour (Workers' and Peasants') Inspection (an independent organ of State Control) and the of amalgamation with the Union of.Civil Servants.

The Central Committee of the Union is of the opinion that a Union must be built up on the industrial basis—that is, according to natural limits of a particular branch of economic activity. In our case such a basis is provided by the scope of the country's financial activities which has every reason to exist independently of any other branch of the Nation’s activities until money is completely abolished and the money circulation stopped once for all. If such is the position, then the employees of various control institutions, having nothing in common with the financial operations, except inspection of the working of the financial (and other) apparatus must be excluded from the Union^[1]. On the other hand the Central Committee does not consider it to be a rational and a benificial policy to create a single Union for all the Public Servants. At the present transitional State of economic reconstruction such a Union would inevitably be a weak and an unwieldy one, so far as coordination of the workers of the most divergent kinds is concerned.

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The structure of the Union, as a whole, is built up in accordance with the general scheme adopted by the whole Russian Trade Unions and also completely in accordance with the decision of the All-Russian Trade Union Congresses, It is only in some details that a difference in structure is to be found.

The units of the Union's organisation is the Local Committees of Employees, which are elected in each institution, office etc. by a general meeting of particular office employees. The legislative authority at each given place is the general assembly of all the workers, employed at that place. In the „goubernias“ (government) the general assembly is substituted by this „Goubernia Congress of Delegates“ which Congress elects the Management Committee for the Goubernia (government); in between congress meetings the Management Committee or Board is responsible for its actions to the conference of local committees of the chief town in the district. Finally, at the apex of the Union organisation stands the All-Russian Delegates Congress, which elects the Central Committee, the organ directing all the Union’s work along the lines laid down by the Congress.

Side by side with these purely Trade-union organs there are organs of a different structure, on which are represented both the Union and the Managements of institutions. Such are the local and central commissions

1) on employment, which engage Employees, appoint them and transfer from one grade to another and keep a record of all the employees.

2) on wages, which decide upon all the questions of remuneration and define the conditions of work.

3) controlling or inspection commissions, which oversee the compliance of the established rules in regard to conditions of work and discipline.

4) arbitration commission—a central one—which settles all the disputes between the Union and the Administrative organs.

The exact statement of all the rights and duties of Treasury Employees, as well as of conditions regulating the relations between the Union and the Institutions in which Union members are working, is to be found in a special „Statement of the rights and duties of Treasury Employees“ approved by the „All-Russian Central Council of Trade Unions“ and the People's Commissary for Labour. This Statement is mostly the code of Soviet Labour Laws specially adapted to Treasury Employees' work.

As a result of past experiences the Union now is drafting a scheme for the amalgamation of the Commission on Employment and the Commission on Wages into a single Commission on Labour Conditions and for abolition of the controlling commission, whose functions are to be automatically transferred to the Union's organs and for the transference of functions of arbitration to the Central Council of trade Unions.

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In the general Trade- union movement the Union occupies an independent position. While all the other Unions submit to the Communist Party leadership with the dictations of which they readily and unconditionally comply, our Union takes the position of strict industrialism, for it has in view the essentially non-party character of the movement and places above all the value of a trade-union as such. Our Union's watchword is:

The guiding star of the Trade Union movement is the will-of the Trade Unions themselves, unhampered by any party's interference and pressure.

Owing to the peculiarities of its development, the movement was always under the exclusive influence of political parties—first of Social Democrats (mensheviks) and then of the Communists. All the Congress Decisions are first and, settled at the meetings of Party’s centres discussed and groups and these Party decisions are enforced by way of a strict party discipline.

This political independence of the Union has brought with it plenty of thorns. The Union's trials were especially severe just after the November Revolution when the Soviet Government nationalised Banks without saying to the Unions of Employees as much as „by your leave“—and trying to use them as technical tools only.

This slight was bitterly resented by Union's members, the Unions began their campaign of opposition which terminates—after nearly six months of incessant fight—by an understanding between the Unions and the Authorities.

The understanding was however not kept. Soon the communist members of the Unions attempted to subjugate them to the Central Committee of the Communist Party. When this attempt failed, when the All-Russian Congress of Treasury Employees approved on May 2nd 1918 the non-party, businesslike character of the Unions the communists seceded and organised their own unions which tried to recruit members by hook or by crook, using freely pressure from the Management. It must be however stated in all fairness that the All-Russian Central Council of Trade Unions refused to countenance the activities of the newly born Trade Union and did not register it. At the same time pressure from the leading spirits of the Communist Party forced the All-Russian Central Committee of Trade Unions to call an extraordinary Congress of the Treasury Employees; and this has been done not through the agency of Central Committee of the Union, but through the agency of a special commission appointed for this purpose. However, even this Congress—convened in an exceptionally short time (to be exact, in 10 days) in January 1919 has not realised the hopes of the Comunists. Three quarters of the delegates supported the non-party character of industrial movement among the Treasury Employees. The Congress reelected their former leaders to the administrative posts. Intentions of the organised workers were too clear that even the dissenters were obliged to come back into the union.

While defending its independence and refusing subordinate its activities to the dictates of any party, the Union is at the same time completely at one with the working class and Soviet Government in their fight against Russian and International Counter Revolution and takes the most active part in the restoration of industrial life in this country. The participation of the Union in constructive work might be more active and benificial should certain mistrust expressed by the authorities wards the Union have had no place in their relations, As it is the Union is labouring in the atmosphere of suspicion, being regarded by the authorities as a non-communist organisation which thereby has no right to have an independent opinion in regard to industrial conditions of workers' life or the trend of financial and technical policy of the department.

Regulation of Remuneration.

It is only by an enormous amount of labour that the idea of obligatory regulation of remuneration was grafted on the minds of Union's members who mistrusted the activities of their own organisation in this particular domain. In addition, extreme youth and ensuing weakness of our industrial movement were not made for laying down a right and proper lines of development of this particular branch of Union's activities. In the period immediately following the March Revolution and ending by the time of that of November, the Union's attention was directed chiefly towards the mechanical increase in rates of wages and salaries; after the latter revolution, when the bourgeoisie was defeated, Union was obliged to regularise the remuneration on its own account and by means devised by itself. Granted the unaccustomed character of the work in question, it is easy to understand that big mistakes have been made good later on by Union's policy of revision. The scale was revised thrice—once in 1918 and twice in 1919–1920,—and this revision, together with decisions reached at special conferences of Wages Commissions, served greatly to enrich Union's experience in regulating remuneration.

It has, however, to be stated with regret that the policy of Soviet Government creates the difficulties in the way of making popular the ideas of regulating renumeration amongst the masses of our members. This policy is placing the public servants into an inferior position (if compared with that of industrial workers) and differentiates on political grounds—without any attention being paid to the role of additional supply of foodstuffs in determination of real rates of wages and groups of workers in regard to rationing them. At present the Union begins to introduce a „payment by results“ system (premium system), in view of a big drop in productivity and critical material conditions prevailing among the Union's Members. The Union has no illusions as regards the beneficial results to be obtained from this reform, as the rationing policy of the government disorganised everything.

As watchwords of the Union in regulation of remuneration may be? the following remarks:

a). To every worker according to his work;

b). Remuneration must depend exclusively on degree of worker's skill and and must include the payments by goods as well as money payments;

c). No privileges must be created for some groups of workers, and particularky no privileges for industrial workers in contradistinction to the employees.

d). The most complete coordination of renumeration, rationing and financial policies.

The Education Work.

Attention of the Union in this particular domain was drawn chiefly to the development of class consciousness and the general intelligence among the members. The Union organises for this purpose lectures, concerts prefaced by speeches of political and other matters, etc. This serves to educate members in theoretical and practical side of the Trade Union Movement, of Socialism, to acquaint them with the most important events in the history of various countries, and to teach them the elements of the pure Science as well. Along with this the Union is trying to educate its members in esthetics by means of staging dramatic and operatic shows, organising purely musical and vocal concerts etc.

Just now the Union commenced to organise its own short time courses in technical instruction. Students, recommended by various local organisations of the Union, will be instructed in theory and practice of the Trade Union Movement, in Socialism, in economics and finance and also in the contemporary financial practice of the Commissariat of Finance, in the organisation of Labour inspection, in foreign trade etc.

The Union has organised consultations on such questions as Continuation schools problems and practice, education of young children, creation of children's crêches, gardens and colonies, etc.

The Union has its own bookshop which supplies the local organisations with carefully selected libraries and also with catalogues, and advises them as to steps to be taken for self education.

The Union publishes its own paper which however is issued very irregularly owing to unfavourable technical conditions in printing trade.

The Part of the Union in Industrial Life.

The Union, greatly interested as it is in the development of industry in our country, has organised under the supervision of the Central Committee a special „Industrial section“, whose function is to consider the problems of industrial organisation in the particular branches of Nation's activities, which interess the Union mostly. Special attention has been paid by the Union to the organisation of bookkeeping and accountancy in the Republic's financial institutions, and also to different methods of control. This work is being done side by side with the Union's participation in various departamental commissions, dealing with the various problems of financial policy and practice. At present the Union is preparing for the coming Congress all the materials relative to its participation in the work of financial and Control Institutions.

The Territories Covered by Union's activities
and its Membership.

The Union is acting on all the territories of Soviet Russia. At the present moment practically every territory recovered from Whites is being put in touch with the Union, partly by means of sending members of the Central Committee to liberated districts, partly by correspondence and partly through the good agencies of those delegates, who are being sent from these districts.

The Union's membership is well up to 130.000, of which number 60.000 are in Great Russia (15.000 in Moscow, 10.000 in Petrograd), 35.000 in Ukraine, 20.000 in South-Eastern districts, and 15,000 in Siberia, Ural etc.

Central Committe of the All-Russian Trade Union
of Treasury Employees.

 

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1. However, the Central Committee does not insist upon this exclusion, having in view close touch between the controlling functions and those directly related to financial activity—both as regards the character and the methods of work.