The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists
was dressed you'd think their fathers was Cabinet Minstrels! No wonder the ratepayers complained of the high rates. Another grievance was that all the Corporation workmen were allowed two days' holiday every year in addition to the Bank Holidays, and were paid for them! (Cries of 'shame,' 'scandalous,' 'disgraceful,' etc.). No private contractor paid his men for Bank Holidays, and why should the Corporation do so? He had much pleasure in seconding Councillor Rush ton's resolution.
Councillor Weakling opposed the motion. He thought that thirty-five shillings a week was little enough for a man to keep a wife and family on (rot), even if all the men got it regularly, which they did not. Members should consider what was the average amount per week throughout the whole year, not merely the busy time; and if they did that they would find that even the skilled men did not average more than twenty-five shillings a week, and in many cases not so much. If this subject had not been introduced by Councillor Rushton, he (Dr Weakling) had intended to propose that the wages of the Corporation workmen should be increased to the standard recognised by the Trades' Unions. (Loud laughter). It had been proved that the notoriously short lives of the working people, whose average span of life was about twenty years less than that of the well-to-do classes, their increasingly inferior physique, and the high rate of mortality amongst their children, were caused by the wretched renumeration they received for hard and tiring work, the excessive number of hours they have to work when employed, the bad quality of their food, the badly constructed and insanitary homes which their poverty compels them to occupy, and the anxiety, worry, and depression of mind they suffer when out of employment. (Cries of 'rot' 'bosh', and loud laughter). Councillor Didlum said 'Rot.' It was a very good word to describe the disease that was sapping the foundations of society and destroying the health and happiness and the very lives of so many of their fellow-countrymen and women. (Renewed merriment and shouts of 'Go and buy a red tie.') He appealed to the members to reject the resolution. He was very glad to say that he believed it was true that the workmen in the employ of the Corporation were a little better off than those in the employ of private contractors, and if it were so, it was as it should be. They had need to be
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