Workers at war

After Winston Churchill, the most powerful man in Britain was Ernest Bevin, the Minister of Labour. Bevin was a trade union leader before the war and was made Minister of Labour in May 1940 by Churchill. Churchill believed that only someone with Bevin's reputation as a fighter for workers' rights could persuade the trade unions to accept the changes which were needed to boost production.

Bevin used a mixture of threats and rewards. The Ministry of Labour had the right to make someone work in an industry which was short of workers, like the mines, for example. It banned strikes (though they still took place). On the other hand, workers were guaranteed a minimum wage and they could not be dismissed from their jobs unless the dismissal was approved by a tribunal. Workers were free to negotiate their wages with their employers.

Neil Demarco: The era of the Second World War; Oxford University Press, 1993/2000, page 61