SHOP STEWARD COMBINE COMMITTEES IN THE BRITISH ENGINEERING INDUSTRY
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-8543.1966.tb00925.x |
| Published date | 01 March 1966 |
| Author | Shirley W. Lerner,John Bescoby |
| Date | 01 March 1966 |
SHOP STEWARD COMBINE COMMITTEES IN THE
BRITISH ENGINEERING INDUSTRY
SHIRLEY W. LERNER*
AND
JOHN
BESCOBY**
THE
purpose of this paper
is
to explain the nature, purposes and
functions of ‘Shop Steward “Combine Committees’’
’
in the British ‘Engin-
eering industry’. Actually, the so-called ‘engineering industryy1 is a complex
of many different industries which produce
a
large variety of different
products. In the context of this paper the ‘engineering industry’ or the
metal trades refers to those firms whose employees’ wages and conditions
fall within the joint negotiating jurisdiction of the Engineering and Allied
Employers’ National Federation and the Confederation of Shipbuilding
and Engineering Unions. Thousands of firms with an employing power
estimated at
570,000
workers do not belong to the Federation but are
nevertheless within the Federation’s jurisdictional area because they
produce products that are included in the ‘engineering industry’. Con-
sequently, the terms negotiated by the Federation and the Confederation
tend to become the minimum terms even for non-federated firms; under
section 8 of the
Terms and Conditions
of
Employment Act,
1959,
the Federation
and/or the Confederation have a statutory right to invoke, through the
Minister
of
Labour, the adjudication of the Industrial Court in cases where
an employer in the engineering industry (be he federated or non-federated)
is not observing the recognized terms and conditions of employment as
laid down by collective agreements. This great industry with its vast
numbers of products and great differences in production techniques can
only be defined within the institutional context of its collective bargaining
system.
Shop stewards who are members of any of the thirty-seven unions
affiliated to the Confederation of Shipbuilding and Engineering Unions
may be found within an engineering works. Those stewards, who are
employed in the
same
works,
unite to form Joint Shop Stewards’ Committees
in order to function more effectively as a part
of
the workshop negotiating
machinery.2 Shop stewards who are members of Joint Shop Stewards’
Committees may also belong to one of two kinds of Combine Committees:
one, considered below, is the industry-wide Combine Committee which is
composed of representatives from the major companies in an industry
*
Lecturer in Industrial Relations, Faculty of Economic and Social Studies, University of
* *
Staff
Tutor, Department of Adult Education, University of Newcastle-upon-Tyne
1
The engineering industry, as defined in this paper, differs from the definition found in the
2
See Shirley
W.
Lerner, ‘Factory Agreements in the British Engineering Industry’,
Znter-
Manchester.
Standard Industrial Classification.
national
Labour
Review,
Vol.
LXXXIX
No.
1,
January
1964.
‘54
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