On This Day, 30 November 1917

Birmingham Daily Gazette

Friday 30 November 1917

SCARCITY OF FOOD.

BIRMINGHAM WORKERS DEMAND BETTER DISTRIBUTION.

At a conference of the Birmingham District Skilled Engineering Trade Unions Federation, the following resolution was unanimously adopted, and copies forwarded to the Prime Minister and Food Controller, viz:-

“That this Federation, representative of 30,000 skilled workmen, draws the Government’s attention to the serious position arising in the district and the prospect of industrial trouble ensuing owing to the inadequate supplies of foodstuffs, coupled with the unfair method of distributing even the limited supplies, and in this direction draws attention to the fact that while the wives and children of the industrial classes are compelled to stand in long queues on the remote chance of ultimately obtaining a limited supply, we are struck by the marked absence from the queues of the wives and children of the employing classes, due to the fact that while long queues wait, the supplies for the upper and middle classes, employers and family are put up behind closed doors after which the remainder, if any, is distributed to our wives and children, and we demand that a fair and equitable distribution of available foodstuffs shall at once be arranged.”