Frank Joseph Delves
Norwich & District Trades & Labour Council
Address to Trades Union Congress held on Tuesday 4th
September 1894 at Norwich
The unorganised district is the natural recruiting ground of
the seater and tyrant . Therefore in coming into the wilds and waste of East
Anglia to seek the one sheep missing, you are, I believe, doing even better
than in visiting the comrades in other parts, where the ninety and nine are
safe in the trade union fold
Another difficulty arises in the nature of our staple industries
in the City itself. These lend themselves to a form of competition which hitherto,
we have found to work disastrously. As a result, you will be prepared to hear
that wages rule low here. The capitalists teach us the lesson of comradeship
and help us appreciate the natural truth of the solidarity of labour.
In the first place we are almost out of the industrial world
here in Norwich
We are very much isolated and alone. The great cities often
North are to us foreign parts and London so only near enough to tempt away our
younger men
This is primarily an agricultural district, possessing all
the characteristics which make such districts almost the despair of the trade
unionist movement. We are surrounded on all sides by agricultural labourers, the
remoteness of whom from each other makes organisation extremely difficult and
costly, while their low wages in the villages and the over spreading endeavour
of farmers to grow crops without the employment of proper labour sends then
into our towns to flood our markets, keep down wages and hinder the workers
organisation
We cannot and should not close any avenue of employment
against women workers except such as lead to brutalizing and poisoning of them (hear
hear) We must make women workers are equals. They must be paid the same as men
workers (Hear, Hear)
You visit Norwich at an auspicious moment, a moment full of
promise for unionism for Norwich is beginning now to assume the characteristic
of a factory town”
Francis "Frank" Joseph Delves (Engineers Union)
1864-1928
Born Norwich
Source:
Evening Mail 5th September 1894
