British Workers and the Productivity Drive

Abstract

As the 1950s wore on, trade unions were coming under increasing criticism for Britain’s relatively poor economic performance (Middlemas 1986: 318; Taylor 1993: 1; Wrigley 1996b: 1–2).1 As Jones wrote, ‘Throughout the period 1951–64 the trade union movement was frequently portrayed in the media as a force which had become too strong and irresponsible’ (Jones 1987: 63). Trade unions as a cause of Britain’s economic troubles have been a consistent thread through Conservative interpretations of British economic history from the 1950s onwards (Tomlinson 2001: 55–8). As we will see in Chapter 5 in the 1960s the setting-up of the Donovan Commission was a product of the growing perception that unions were slowing down Britain’s growth rate. The productivity agencies and trade unionists were aware of the need to increase Britain’s productivity growth rate and improve Britain’s economic performance. Various issues of the BPC Bulletin, carried articles telling its readers the following, ‘Germany’s productivity is now rising fast. She has not passed us yet, but she promises to do so . . .’2 One reader of Target, the BPC Bulletin, wrote to its editor saying ‘. . . our official advisers keep reminding us that the increase in Britain’s productive rate is not as great as that of either Germany, Russia, America or France’.3 In 1965 the newly appointed chairman of the BPC told his readers that, ‘In fact, the need to raise productivity will always be with us, as with every country. The trouble has been that, in general, our chief competitors have been making, for various reasons, a better job of it than we have.’⁴