GREAT BRITAIN: The King Joins the Union

With the Tudor buildings of England a society is crumbling. Each week the foundations of a new social structure emerge a little more clearly from the rubble of the old. Last week three unrelated happenings showed the shape of this new society.

>Cornerstone of the new structure is Britain’s one big union, the Trades Union Congress, of which aitchless Labor Minister Ernest Bevin (“Britain’s Next Prime Minister” to his friends) is the dominating figure. Chairman of T. U. C. is Ernest Bevin’s good friend George Gibson, who used to be a male nurse in an insane asylum. Last week ex-Nurse Gibson inducted into T. U. C. its first and only royal honorary member, His Majesty King George VI.

The occasion was the presentation by the unions which make up T. U. C. of 27 Y. M. C. A. mobile canteens. When the King, accompanied by his Queen, arrived in Buckingham Quadrangle to receive the canteens he was five minutes late for the ceremony. Barrel-chested, brindle-haired George Gibson boomed: “If you were a worker, you’d already have been fined.” The King giggled.

George Gibson introduced the new member to the 32 members of T. U. C.’s General Council with wisecracks. Example: “This is Tom O’Brien, an Irishman masquerading as a Welshman.” When the Queen’s ear caught the accent of Miner Will Lawther she chimed in: “What part of the north do you come from?”

“From Durham,” said Lawther.

“I have associations there,” the Queen said.

“I know. Your family’s place is near the pit where I used to work.”

Chairman Gibson then handed the King the Trades Union Council’s gold membership medal. “Can I now attend any T. U. C. meeting in the country?” asked the King.

“Yes, sir,” said George Gibson.

“Thank you,” said George Windsor, who some day may need a union card.

>T. U. C.’s Amalgamated Engineers Union met in Southport to vote whether to call a nationwide strike of 1,500,000 construction laborers. The issue was a threepence-an-hour wage increase. If the strike motion carried, it might mean the end of the peaceful building of the common man’s Britain. After four hours of argument a 48-year-old grey-haired Welshman named Owen Jenkins stood up. Owen Jenkins said he had two sons in the service. “Could I face my boys if they came back, looked me in the eyes and said to me: ‘You voted for a strike while we were defending our country?’ Is a few bob all that matters in this world? Who cares whether you get five pounds or five pounds four shillings a week when your neighbors’ homes are being blown down? ‘Breathes there the man with soul so dead who never to himself hath said: This is my own, my native land.’ ” Owen Jenkins sat down. The strike motion lost by 25 votes to 11.

>Royal dukes customarily sign letters with only their Christian names. The Duke of Gloucester wrote to T. U. C.’s onetime Chairman William Holmes on Red Cross matters and signed the letter “Henry.” Taking it for granted that this was a democratic gesture, William Holmes wrote back: “Dear Henry,” signed his letter “Bill.”