Communications and transit > Enquiry on national public works

— 192
have had to pay the commune as a subsidy if unemployment relief had been granted to
the same workers. After that date, the subsidy was fixed at a certain percentage of the
wage to be paid, as decided by the Commission, in each commune authorised to undertake
such work with the financial aid of the State. For reserve works of this category, the
guiding principle was that wages should be fixed in accordance with the same rules as
those applicable to State reserve works. , ,, .
The Commission determined the maximum number of unemployed who could, m
each particular case, be occupied on work of this kind executed in the commune.
“ Anticipatory ” works (Beredskapsarbeten).— The defects of the above system, to
which we shall refer later, led the public authorities to decide in 1931 to make a few slight
changes. For each of the budgetary years 1931-32 and 1932-33, the Chambers placed
at the Government’s disposal a special credit for the execution of public works intended
to relieve unemployment, the money to be spent on works which in any case would sooner
or later have had to be executed at public expense and through some central authority
and for which, owing to their nature, the Riksdag would, in normal times, have voted;
the credits demanded by the Government. These “ anticipatory ” works were not subject
to any special rules, but the authorities concerned were allowed to carry them out m
accordance with the methods followed for other works. Only works that would ordinarily
have been executed by or through the State authorities were allowed to be undertaken
as “ anticipatory ” work. The credits for the purpose had, moreover to be used exclu¬
sively for work which could be completed without the Riksdag being obliged to vote new
credits in a subsequent financial year.
Defects of the system—In the autum of 1930, as the effects oi the latest crisis became
more noticeable, it also became clearer that there were certain inherent defects m the
system of unemployment relief previously followed. , , rVrUral
As stated above, the reserve works to be carried out through the Central
Unemployment Commission or by means of State subsidies had to be such as would no ,
as far as could be foreseen, have to be carried out under open-market conditions m the
next few years. This principle obviously limited the choice of works to be undertaken.
It was also thought that there was no call to devote—and that by way of preference—both
labour and capital to work the execution of which did not seem likely to become imperative
in the near future. The objections to the system then in force also increased propor¬
tionately to the number of unemployed in need of relief, and the sums which consequently
had to be devoted to that end. As a result of increased unemployment, the system
tended to place a disproportionate burden on the communes m which unemployed were
domiciled. The measures taken by the State to combat unemployment proved, m fact,
to be quite inadequate, so that the communes were forced to bear a very large
part of the cost of unemployment relief without receiving any subsidy from the
Government ^ ^ serious criticism levelled against the policy previously followed related
to the form of the relief accorded to the unemployed. In spite of the rule which had
been laid down, the unemployed, in far too many cases, had been given pecuniary aid
instead of work. From the point of view of the unemployed also, the above-mentioned
defects—namely, the insufficiency of the subsidies and the totally inadequate extent to
which it was possible to afford relief in the form of work—were very appreciab e
With the accentuation of the depression, all these defects became more noticeab ^
It therefore seemed indispensable to effect a radical revision of the policy hitherto
pursued by the State in the matter of unemployment relief. After the necessary enquiries
had been conducted in the autumn of 1932, the Government submitted to the Riksdag at
its 1933 session, a vast and comprehensive plan of campaign against the economic crisis,
based on new principles.