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Aviation History
1918
1918 - 0660.PDF
JUNE 13.. 1918. TRADE PARLIAMENTS AND THEIR WORK. By ERNEST J. P. BENN, Chairman Industrial Reconstruction Council. VIII—SCIENCE AND EDUCATION. So far, in building up the case for Trade Parliaments, I have dealt only with that portion of their work which may be described as reconstruction work—matters which will require to be settled the moment that hostilities cease, and which must consequently be studied well in advance. But when the reconstruction or transition period is over there will still be plenty of regular work left to occupy the energies and attention of Trade Parliaments. The subject of the relation of science to industry furnishes an excellent example of the need of co-operation between the various manufacturers engaged in a trade and between those manufacturers and the labour unions. There has recently been established a new Government Office known as the Department of Scientific and Industrial Research, which is charged with the duty of rendering such assistance as may be possible to industry. During the two years of its existence this Department has already been inundated with requests for help and guidance on scientific problems arising in connection with various trades. The Department has already issued two annual reports which are full of interest for the student of industrial develop- ments. They are, of course, particularly useful as a state- ment of the policy which the Government is pursuing in con- nection with this important question. A grant of a million sterling has been made for this purpose, and from this the Research "Department is able to offer financial assistance on a pro rata scale. Progress has been so rapid that there are already seven research associations with articles in draft and approaching completion ; ten others are beginning to draft articles, and eleven more trades are Considering the formation of research associations. As the first of the great industries to move in this direction we may take cotton as an example of the rest. A provisional committee of research and education for the cotton industry was formed by the trade, and has been at work for some time on the constitution of a cotton research association. In connection with the work of this Committee a series of articles appeared in the Manchester Guardian, which constitutes quite the best statement of the case for scientific research in industry that has yet been published. These articles attracted so much attention that the Committee arranged for their publication in pamphlet form, and this pamphlet is available at the offices of the Cotton Committee, 108, Deansgate, Manchester. The cotton industry appears to have awakened to the fact that it is being carried on to-day exactly as it was fifty years ago, and that no improvements in machinery worth the name have been introduced since the days of Arkwright, and, worst of all, that neither masters nor operatives have between them any very great knowledge of the scientific properties of cotton or of the prospects of its increased cultivation or manufacture. What applies to cotton applies to almost every one of our trades. No industry can hope to prosper for long which is not supplied with a continual stream of new knowledge. Scientific research, as conducted by the Cotton Association, will be a very different thing from the sort of research that has hitherto been conducted in a small way by various enterprising manufacturers. To get the best out of research it needs to be conducted on a large scale. It is not suggested that there should be any interference with the manufacturer who keeps his own laboratory for the purpose of improving his information with regard to the details of his own business. But it is a fact that quite in addition to anything that can be done in this way The Flying Temperament. LECTURING before the Institute of Public Health the other day on "The Health Aspects of Aeronautics," Major Martin W. Flack, of the Research Department of the Air Ministry, said that it was a constant strain to the human organism, and a very severe strain, to be able to go up in an atmosphere where oxygen is getting rare and to adapt the bodily needs to that condition. Unless measures were taken for protection, or the airman was a superman, collapse would inevitably occur. It was the function of the air medical officer to look upon the pilots under his charge as human machines, to say whether they were fit to take the air, and to take steps to remove any signs of mental or physical distress. To this end he advocated a system of tests of the respiratory and other organs, which would enable a medical officer to tell whether a pilot was deteriorating or not. It was obvious that a pilot must have there is the need for the considered attention of the best scientific brains to the main problems of every trade. Every industry pays enormous sums of money for its fire insurance. One or two trades have been so impressed with the total amount spent in this way that they have thought it well to establish their own special insurance offices. Fire in- surance is universally recognised as one of the necessary expenses of business, as manufacturers require to be assured that if they are overtaken by a serious fire they will be in a position to repair the damage. It is estimated that a sum far less than that spent upon fire insurance would provide each trade with an insurance that is far more necessary to it—an insurance against the risk that American laboratories or Japanese universities, or German technical skill will not one day rob the trade of everything it possesses. So urgent is this question of science and industry that the Scientific and Industrial Research Department is now occupied in promoting special research associations in most of the leading trades. The Department and the trades have all agreed that it is impossible to wait for the establishment of proper self-governing bodies, which could take over these functions But it is obvious that if a complete system of trade self government is evolved from the present discussions, then the research associations now being formed will become part of that system of government. Education is another kindred subject with which little progress can be made until our trades get together and decide to tackle it. We spend to-day in one way and another something over £1,000,000 a week in education. Of this vast sum a proportion is expended on technical and trade education. There are many thousands of trade schools up and down the country. Every educational authority has arrangements of some sort for teaching the technique of the leading trades in its locality. Several of the modern universities have special departments of interest to particular trades. The Board of Education subsidise many hundreds of technical classes and technical institutes, and yet, with one solitary exception, there is no single case on record of any official connection between our trades and our technical education. It is perfectly true that most of these educational facilities are arranged by committees upon which so-called experts are invited to sit. Thus the Education Committee of one of the counties may invite the opinion of one or two leading electrical engineers in establishing classes for education in electrical theory and practice. But apart from this hap- hazard connection there is, as I have said, only one case of a trade as a trade taking any official interest in the boys and girls who are presently to form that trade. This solitary exception is the School of Mines at Trefoys, which is main- tained by the mineowners and the miners. They have together consented to a levy upon every ton of coal pro- duced in their district, and thus formed a fund out of which the School of Mines is carried on. If our trades are to be fitted in the future to meet the competition of an educated and progressive world, they must obviously put their heads together and see that they are provided with a continuous supply of recruits specially fitted for the business of their lives. When that complete system of trade self-government for which some of us are pleading so earnestly is established upon a proper footing, each Trade Parliament will have powers to raise a levy for the purposes of education, and technical education will at last stand a chance of being of real service to our industries. good vision, good hearing, and good hands, but lung- capacitywas the most important consideration. The successful pilot was generally a deep breather, whotook in more oxygen per unit breath than the ordinary man, and was able to hold his breath longer. At the same time,what was known as the " flying temperament" would to a certain extent overcome physical disability, and one of theirmost famous airman was a man of diminutive stature. In ground training hardening exercises should be insistedupon, as there was no doubt that a man so hardened, sitting in light clothing, had a much smaller oxygen usage than onewho had not undergone the treatment. Careful watching was necessary in regard to drinking and smoking, and mentaldistraction, such as gardening, was of the greatest impoftanqe. The necessity of a flying medical officer being a speciallytrained man was emphasised by Sir W. Watson Cheyne, who presided. * ' '••-'-• v - • ,- --
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