Distribution of Industry Act 1945

The Distribution of Industry Act 1945 (8 & 9 Geo. VI c. 36) was an Act of Parliament in the United Kingdom intended to help redevelop areas, such as south-western Scotland, which depended heavily on specific heavy industries, and which had been hard-hit by unemployment in the inter-war period.

The Act gave the government two main powers, namely:

To schedule "development areas" where the Government was able to build factories for rental to private enterprise, and to manage industrial estates itself
To require that the site for any factory above a certain size should be decided on by discussion between the firm proposing to build it and the Board of Trade.

This plan, mostly prepared by Hugh Dalton, the President of the Board of Trade, was contentious; it was felt by many to be encouraging a planned economy. John Sydney Wardlaw-Milne, a Conservative MP, described it in debate as "the very antithesis of private enterprise ... bureaucracy and Socialism carried to the last limit".

Effects

From June 1945 to January 1950, some 481 government-built and 505 private-built installations (factories, factory extensions, etc.) were built in development areas under the Act, creating an estimated 200,000 jobs (40% of which were taken by women); unemployment in depressed areas fell from 550,000 before the War (July 1938) to under 100,000 in July 1950. A further 279 installations were under construction, with 356 approved but not yet under way; these were predominantly private projects.

In Scotland, projects in the main Scottish Development Area in the central belt created 60,000 jobs by the beginning of 1950, with 15,000 elsewhere in the country; this was expected to rise to 120,000 once planned projects had been completed. Unemployment in the region stood at 41,000 (3½%), compared to 115,000 (12%) before the War. Outside the main development area, major projects included a new industrial estate in Dundee, diversifying local industry away from a dependence on jute, and the Inverness area becoming a scheduled area in 1948, to develop industry in tandem with a new hydro-electric power scheme.

In Wales, most of the industrial areas in South Wales were scheduled as a development area, along with the Wrexham region in the north. 264 installations had been built by May 1950, with 81 under construction and 104 approved; more than half of the factories completed had been Government-funded. Twenty-six of the factories built or planned were intended to provide special employment for those disabled through mining work.

References

Facts and Figures for Socialists, 1951. Labour Party Research Department, London, 1950

United Kingdom legislation

Pre-Parliamentary legislation	List of English statutes Charter of Liberties Magna Carta

Acts of Parliament by states preceding the Kingdom of Great Britain	Acts of the Parliament of England to 1483 1485–1601 1603–1641 Interregnum (1642–1660) 1660–1699 1700–1706 Acts of the Parliament of Scotland

Acts of Parliament of the Kingdom of Great Britain	1707–1719 1720–1739 1740–1759 1760–1779 1780–1800

Acts of the Parliament of Ireland	to 1700 1701–1800

Acts of Parliament of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland and the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland	1801–1819 1820–1839 1840–1859 1860–1879 1880–1899 1900–1919 1920–1939 1940–1959 1960–1979 1980–1999 2000 to date Halsbury's Statutes Legislation.gov.uk Short titles

Church of England measures	List Church of England Assembly (Powers) Act 1919

Legislation of devolved institutions	Acts of the Scottish Parliament List Acts and Measures of the National Assembly for Wales List Acts of the Northern Ireland Assembly List Acts of the Parliament of Northern Ireland List Orders in Council for Northern Ireland List

Orders-in-Council	Order in Council

Secondary legislation	United Kingdom Statutory Instruments Scottish Statutory Instruments Acts of Sederunt Acts of Adjournal

This article is issued from Wikipedia - version of the 1/9/2013. The text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share Alike but additional terms may apply for the media files.