British Jews in Jeopardy - 1933-1945 and Beyond: The Role of the Trades Advisory Council

by Lenny Goodrich

Introduction  

“A Nation….is a group of persons united by a common error about their ancestry and a common dislike of their neighbours”. ⁱ 

We are indebted to the family of the late Maurice Orbach (former Labour MP and prominent Zionist) for depositing extensive papers and other material with the National Archive relating to a significant, yet under-reported aspect of pre-war years Anglo-Jewish life. Orbach was the influential general secretary of the Trades Advisory Council and his extensive archive, now held by UCL, shines an important light on the transformational approach of the Jewish establishment to growing antisemitism during the years 1933 to 1945 and beyond. The archive expands the well documented debate between, on the one hand, the Board of Deputies’ reluctance to sanction direct action to counter the rise in antisemitic activities (notably by the British Union of Fascists) and on the other hand, centre-left communal voices calling for direct action to challenge this emerging threat. Yet there has been little academic analysis of the TAC’s structural significance in its more than half-century promotion of Jewish commerce and business. 

The emergence of nationalist groups in Britain during the years 1933 to 1939, aligned to and adopting antisemitic rhetoric is well documented as is the Board of Deputies’ response. The narrative pronounced by these nationalist groups against Anglo-Jewry (whose numbers had expanded tenfold between 1850 and 1939ⁱⁱ) presented the Board with “the most serious external threat that Anglo-Jewry had faced since the Readmission in the seventeenth century”ⁱⁱⁱ.  

The Board’s innate caution sounded in disapproval of overt defensive action given its perception of institutional and societal reluctance to endorse or encourage these political extremes. Notwithstanding, after internal pressure, the Board developed a policy to defend Britain’s Jews against the perceived threat by adopting two distinct approaches. First, the systematic use of counterpropaganda to correct perceived false assumptions about Jewish life. Second, the initiation of measures to moderate the behaviour of Jewish traders which the Board feared was a major contributor to growing antisemitism.  

Developing this propaganda offensive and reflecting a view in the leadership that much misinformation about Jewish life and practice emanated from commercial activities within the community, the Board reluctantly formalised the TAC in 1940 as “a functional organisation primarily concerned with the fostering of good relations between Jewish and non-Jewish traders, the elimination of anti-Semitism in industry and commerce and the maintenance of the highest standards of commercial practice in the ranks of the Community.” ^iv 

Whilst the TAC played a significant role in the execution of this policy, historians have to date paid little attention to its work nor to the true motivating factors behind its creation, beyond recognising its existence and limited remit to provide advice to the Board on matters of commerce involving Jewish traders. The recent release of this important archival material^v presents an opportunity to explore the motivation and objectives behind the TAC’s creation revealing a more profound ambition towards Jewish commercial and social life than has heretofore been understood.  

The TAC’s Birth and Quest for Operational Independence 

The Archive demonstrates that the TAC was not just a response to the Board’s counterpropaganda approach but that this broadly independent organisation (albeit under the auspices of the Board’s Jewish Defence Committee) aimed to sustain and promote the reputational characteristics of Anglo-Jewish commercial life. The TAC facilitated a novel strategic change by supporting desired good practice within the Jewish business community with a formal structure to resolve trading disputes, apply sanctions, and establish controls. This attracted the approbation of British authorities.  

It was not simply the approach to counter antisemitism which justified the JDC’s desire to establish this sub-committee, but also that it should “prepare the ground for the meeting of the problems to be encountered in the post-war world.”^vi Minutes of the TAC’s first meeting confirm the appointment of Cyril Ross as its first Chairman. This set the tone for future leadership. Ross was a successful businessman, philanthropist, Board member, and owner of the renowned West End furriers, Swears & Wells. The concept came to Ross following discussions with a group of French furriers visiting London for the October Public Sales who were members of a similar trade support organisation in France. Invitees to the inaugural meeting were representatives of the furniture, fur, jewellery, fashion, clothing, chemical industry and cinema trades, evidence from the outset that the TAC’s ambition was broad.  

The meeting resolved that each member should pay an annual membership fee of one Guinea, and that Alec Nathan (a member of the family owning the Glaxo chemicals empire) should, together with Cyril Ross, represent the TAC on the JDC (Ross was already a JDC member). 

By 1940 ad-hoc members had become frustrated by the Board’s failure to more positively promote the TAC. They could see that disturbed economic conditions arising out of unavoidable war restrictions spelled danger for the Jewish community. They were convinced that the post-war economic environment and consequential communal dangers would be such that “economic distress could be used by political demagogues in order to fan the flames of religious hatred.”^vii  

Alec Nathan approached LCC member, Maurice Orbach, a man with extensive secretarial trade association experience, to join the TAC as its permanent Secretary. Led by Nathan and Orbach, the members constructed a Memorandum^viii to the JDC setting out their ambitions for the immediate and post-war worlds. This “Memorandum” proposed twelve key steps to be taken by the TAC, ranging from the establishment of a national reach of influence seeking that every Jewish trader and business would become a TAC member, to the establishment of a network of contacts with national trade organisations, trade federations, Chambers of Commerce, Trades Unions, and so on. 

Prominent industrialist, Sir Robert Waley-Cohen was appointed President and “secured the patronage of outstanding and eminent Jewish business and professional men who became Vice-Presidents.”^ix The latter included political, commercial, and industrial personalities such as Lords Nathan and Melchett (the latter of ICI fame); Sir Montague Burton (founder of the Burton clothing empire); Albert Van den Bergh (a family member of the Dutch food industrialists ultimately to be incorporated into Unilever); Sigmund Gestetner (Managing Director of the eponymous printing business) and John Goodenday (founder and chairman of the nationally popular hosiery manufacturer, Kayser Bondor). These Anglo-Jewish luminaries were later joined by retailer Marcus Sieff (of Marks & Spencer fame) to form a significantly influential trading and commercial voice for the Jewish community. On 6 March 1941, the Committee solidified its role by adopting a formal constitution.  

Various trades and industries across Britain in which Jews were engaged were affiliated with separate regional committees purposed towards three core objectives. “Goodwill” - the ambition to connect with persons of influence, trade organisations and public bodies to further the TAC’s objectives; “Co-Operation” - the desire on the part of the broad community to “integrate itself into the life of the Nation”; and “Integrity” - the desire to maintain standards and the resolution to assist the authorities in dealing with cases of delinquency by members of the community.  This comprehensive structure (illustrated by the TAC table below at Figure 1^x) demonstrates the ambition of the TAC’s founding members. Keen to avoid the charge that it was working towards the exclusive protection of Jewish traders’ interests, the Council stressed that it was neither a trade protection association nor a trade organisation. The response from the Anglo-Jewish trading community during the years following the TAC’s creation was significant. By 1942, the TAC had established area councils in 26 provincial centres^xi and within seven years of its creation boasted 8,300 business members.^xii 

Sub-committees with specific responsibilities in the areas of finance and general purposes, investigations, publications and editorial, statistics and labour relations were established. The Investigations sub-committee dealt not only with cases where delinquent members were reprimanded or expelled but, importantly, offered an arbitration service to mediate disputes, whether between Jewish traders or involving at least one non-Jewish trader. The TAC issued a series of significant publications with the aim of providing effective information about the historic growth of Jewish involvement in trade and commerce, laying important foundations for the establishment of a stable Jewish commercial platform in Britain. Of significance, was economist Noah Barou’s ‘The Jews in Work and Trade’.^xiii This brief statistical analysis (a compendium of articles previously appearing in TAC bulletins) purported to track the immediate post 1945 distribution and economic characterisation of Jews across the globe following the holocaust. In setting out the essential facts of Jewish economic life, Barou aimed not only to provide an empirical tool for TAC members and information for non-Jews in the fight against antisemitism, but also a manifesto for the re-adaptation of a traumatised global Jewish population.  

A further important TAC publication^xiv primarily aimed at the non-Jewish populace. This diminutive booklet purported to provide answers to some 40 diverse questions “which should help to remove those false impressions which are still so widely accepted and so improve good relations between Christian and Jew in the field of industry and commerce.”^xv Examples included - What is (a) the global and (b) the British Empire Jewish population? When did the Jews arrive in Britain? What contribution have Jews made to the economic and social life of Britain and the British Empire? Are Jews in control of the Civil Service or any department of it? Do Jews control Britain’s financial system? What are the facts about Sunday trading? Why are Jews so largely engaged in trade? And so on. 

Anthropologist Maurice Freedman was one of few scholars to have reviewed and commented in any detail on the work of the TAC.^xvi Freedman reported that the TAC represented about one-third of Britain’s Jewish traders and businessmen and that between 1946 and 1949, some 803 disputes were handled in areas such as discrimination in employment; lettings; insurance; unethical conduct; disputes between Jewish businesses and between Jewish and non-Jewish businesses; formal arbitrations and trade practices.  

Following its formal creation in 1940, the TAC’s focus was to seek to resolve disputes by negotiation, mediation, and arbitration. The approach was to reflect the desire, on the one hand, to acknowledge that Anglo-Jewry should adhere to British laws and the British legal system but on the other hand, to restrain appearances before the British courts to frustrate forces of antisemitism. The TAC produced twelve Secretariat Instruction Memos (expressed to be internal and confidential and available for its executives in their dealings with the wider membership) which explained aspects of the TAC’s structure, policy, aims and approach.  

What can be said with some confidence is that this approach was a deliberate attempt, not only to reduce the impact of such disputes upon wider British society, but also to build an effective commercial platform from which Anglo-Jewish commercial players could fairly operate and hopefully thrive in the post war years.   

Conclusion 

Consideration of the role played by the TAC in Anglo-Jewish affairs has to date received superficial scholarly attention. Formed by a new commercial elite, the TAC was keen to establish a sustainable platform to preserve the commercial stability of Jewish businesses (including their own) as well as a focused and influential organisation which could stabilise and stimulate post war Anglo-Jewish commercial activity.  

This ambition was deliberate and had two effects. First, supporting the Board’s defence policy of challenging false assumptions about the Jewish community by promoting counterpropaganda and education. Second, establishing a non-statutory regulatory body capable of both influencing and regulating the commercial behaviour of Jewish traders, and working with state regulatory authorities to win trust and legitimacy for the platform upon which Jewish owned businesses could be seen to contribute meaningfully to the British economy. The latter is evidenced by the TAC’s longevity as an organisation, lasting until the early 1990s by which time, a generational change in the character and ambition of the potential membership, left the TAC with little choice but to cease operational activity.  In effect, the TAC had achieved its ambition. 

Endnotes

i Unattributed quote by Karl W. Deutsch in Preface to ‘Nationalism and its Alternatives’, (New York, Alfred A. Knopf, 1969) 

ii Colin Holmes, ‘Anti-Semitism in British Society 1876-1939’ (London, Routledge,1978) p.4 

iii  Daniel Tilles, ‘Some Lesser-Known Aspects – The Anti-Fascist Campaign of the Board of Deputies of British Jews, 1936-1940’ in ‘New Directions in Anglo-Jewish History’, ed. Geoffrey Alderman (Boston, Academic Studies Press, 2010) p.135

iv Trades Advisory Council, ‘Questions and Answers’, (London, T.A.C. Publications, Second Edition., 1945), p.40.

v Trades Advisory Council, ‘Questions and Answers’, (London, T.A.C. Publications, Second Edition., 1945), p.40.

vi Secretariat Instruction Memo No.1 – The Trades Advisory Council – What it is and its History’, 1947, (TAC/2/4)

vii Minutes of the First Meeting of the TAC, 1938, (TAC/1/1, p.2)

viii ‘Outline of the Policy and Proposed Programme of the Trades’ Advisory Council’, June 1940, (TAC/2/1) 

ix Secretarial Instruction Memo No.1, (see endnote 6), p.2

x Archive, TAC/2/4

xi Notes of National Administrative Council AGM, February 1942, (Archive, TAC/2/2) 

xii Noah Barou, ‘The Jews in Work and Trade’, (London, Trades Advisory Council, 3^rd Edition 1948), p.5 (TAC/5/1) 

xiii Ibid.

xiv ‘Questions and Answers’, See endnote 4

xv Ibid, Foreword, p.2

xvi Maurice Freedman, ‘Jews in the Society of Britain’ in ‘A Minority In Britain – Social Studies of the Anglo-Jewish Community’, ed. Freedman (London, Vallentine Mitchell, 1955), pp.201-262