Labour unrest at the Spitfire factory
How labour unrest nearly lost us the Battle of Britain
How it nearly cost us the war
The Spitfire was undoubtedly the greatest British fighter plane ever built, adored by its pilots for its speed, grace and manoeuvrability. When it first flew on 5 March 1936, it marked a revolutionary advance for the RAF, whose fleets were then still largely made up of fabric-covered biplanes. The Air Ministry, headed by the tough Yorkshireman Lord Swinton as Secretary of State for Air, was so impressed that it immediately ordered 310 of the planes from its designer, the Supermarine company based at Southampton. But then the trouble started. Because the Spitfire was such a technologically advanced aircraft, the Supermarine staff initially found it difficult to build. Nor did the company have the capacity for a major government order. Much of the work had to be sub-contracted out to other firms, which led to chaos with drawings and the delivery of parts.
Supermarine had promised the government that the first Spitfires would roll off the production line in September 1937, but by early 1938 not a single plane had been built. With the menace of Nazi Germany now looming over Europe, the situation was desperate. Lord Swinton called it ‘a disgraceful state of affairs’. But he was the one who paid the price. In May 1938 he was forced to resign after the government had been attacked in the Commons over its failure to re-arm the RAF. Swinton’s successor as Air Secretary was the owlish, bespectacled lawyer Sir Kingsley Wood, a sound administrator but an uncharismatic politician. ‘A feeble little creature,’ was the description of him by Lord Reith, head of the BBC.
Belying his image for timidity, Wood immediately took a dramatic step which he hoped would break the Spitfire logjam. He ordered the construction of a vast new factory at Castle Bromwich in Birmingham with the aim of turning out 1,000 Spitfires, ‘the largest single order for one type of aircraft ever placed in this country’, reported the Times breathlessly. But Sir Kingsley Wood made a fatal mistake. He handed over the management of this project to the motor magnate Lord Nuffield, founder of the Morris car empire. Lord Nuffield was regarded by the government as an expert in mass production, but in truth by the late 1930s he had lost his dynamism and grip on detail. One sign of his declining power was the increasing eccentricity in his personal habits. Obsessed with his health, he drank large quantities of bicarbonate of soda, believing that this was an antidote to his chronic wind, though it usually had the opposite effect.
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Tim Hawkins
November 15th, 2007 4:41pmA very interesting perspective that rings true! I was a boy at the time and have read many books on the subject.
Herbert Thornton
November 15th, 2007 7:52pmThis account reminds me of a conversation I had - around 1966 - with a man then in his seventies.
Early in World War II he had worked as a skilled machinist in a factory in South Lancashire that manufacted equipment of some sort for the armed forces.
He described to me how a group of time & motion study experts from the government visited the factory to study how production might be increased and made more efficient.
He went into considerable detail about how he and he co-workers delibetately exaggerated how much time was required to operate the factory's various machine tools with the required degree of precision.
He said that they were so successful at hoodwinking the experts that shortly afterwards he and his fellow workers ware awarded considerably increased wages - and the rate of production was decreased.
He thought that having arranged things so that they did considerably less work for much more money was a considerable triumph.
Kenneth Perry
November 15th, 2007 9:59pmI worked in the Air Ministry before being called up in March 1940 & saw many files relating to the Spitfire & the Shadow Factory Schene. I would not dispute any details of this "researched" article,but it is an incomplete & incorrect picture. The Spitfire was a sophisticated hand tooled plane,not susceptible to mass production,unlike the Hurricane. And it was the Hurricane that won the Battle of Britain. The Shadow Factory Scheme embraced Aircraft Engines more than Aiframes & other Car Manufacturers besides Lord Nuffield. There was greed & selfishness amonst civilian workers who escaped call up,but 50% income tax,rationing,with copmpulsory Fire Watching & Home Guard duties were mitigating factors.The famed "Community Spirit"of1940 did indeed exist because none of us could escape the stark reality that we were alone.
Guy Wilson
November 16th, 2007 6:40pmI was under the impression that the lack of trained pilots represented the greatest threat to success during the Battle of Britain, not the lack of aircraft. Spitfire production may have been a problem but, as Mr Perry has pointed out, the Hurricane was of much greater significance. Nevetheless, an interesting perspective on the reality of the time.
Gervas Douglas
November 22nd, 2007 4:39pmThese Nuffield workers were not the only people who undermined our war effort. Michael Foot tried to get the Welsh miners out on strike during the war. Whose side was he on??
Nicholas Millman
November 25th, 2007 10:03amGuy Wilson - yes, you are correct that pilot availability was a more critical factor. I thought it curious that in an article about Battle of Britain era Spitfire production The Spectator should choose an image of a much later mark (IX?) flying over the D-Day invasion force to illustrate the article! I hope that is not down to the author of a book about the Spitfire?