75A
SUMMARY OF MEMORANDUM ON TRADE UNIONISM
IN HONG KONG (ENCLOSURE TO NO. 75)
NO.75)
1. Labour Organisation in Hong Kong, as in China, was
not an organic growth arising out of a struggle for better
wages or working conditions. It was from birth caught up
with a revolutionary movement in China which determined its
development according to political exigency rather than the
needs of the workers themselves. So far as Hong Kong
was concerned, the politics which dominated the growth
of Trade Unions were Chinese politics, and the Unions so
formed were instruments in the hands of politicians completely
unconcerned with the Colony's economic and social problems.
2. Following the outbreak of war in 1939 the cost of
living in Hong Kong rose sharply, and the Unions found
themselves engaged in a genuine struggle to secure wage
increases. This was considered an unique opportunity to
foster genuine Trade Unionism, and every encouragement was
extended to the workers to organise themselves. The result
was a remarkable growth of genuine Trade Unionsim in 1940
and 1941.
3. This progress was completely smashed by the Japanese,
and on the liberation the organisations which had been coming
into prominence in 1940 and 1941 were found to be almost
completely absent. In their place were found
(a) a very strong movement by the K.M. T. To infiltrate
and gain control of any new labour organisation
(b) a counter-movement sponsored by members of the
Chinese Communist Party to establish organisations which,
while not openly Communist, were united in opposition to the
K.M. T.
Besides these two clearly defined groups there are other
Unions, and a large number of embryonic Unions, over most
of
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