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- 19.
be given to the social effects of large scale un-
employment and lost jobs. The common practice in
industry was to fire the last to be hired. Since in
recent years hirings had been increasingly of negroes,
....
these would be the first to be left jobless and this
was a situation which the U.S., Government did not
want to see happen and which would negate the advances
made by the Government's poverty programme.
It was no
good telling the Labour Unions that they had never had
it so good. The Unions could read the unemployment
figures and were only prepared to put one interpretation
on them despite the efforts of the U.S. Government to
present a balanced picture.
45.
Mr. Jordan said that even if it were conceded
that there had been a decline in employment in textiles
there was nothing to show that this decline was as a
result of imports. He again ande the point that other
industries were holding out the inducement of higher
wages and thereby creating vacancies in the textile
industry. On the other hand, it was hard to reconcile
Mr. Nehmer's statements with those in the Daily News
Record which had reported on several occasions that
there was labour shortage in the textile industry.
He
read out several extracts to illustrate his point.
/46.
CONFIDENTIAL