Headquarters Department HQ

The files contain memoranda on labour policy and history of aspects of trade unionism, and there are papers on the bills for which the Ministry was responsible, in particular the Hours of Employment bill, and the Restoration of Pre-War Practices bill. Files of the Intelligence Division deal with such questions as the Glossary of Occupations, changes in retail prices, memoranda on strikes, etc.

See also the TB and related series, LAB 7/243-276:

See also the IR series, LAB 7/181-196:

For earlier files see ML, LAB 7/216: LAB 7/216

The Headquarters Department was formed in 1917. It combined the Joint Industrial Council Division set up in February 1917, and the Labour Intelligence Division set up in May, with the Trade Board Division transferred from the Board of Trade. The department ended in September 1918, when responsibility for Joint Industrial Councils and Trade Boards passed to the new Industries Department, and Labour Intelligence merged with Labour Statistics in March 1919. Most of the work of the Industries Department was taken over by the Wages and Arbitration Department in 1920, which was then renamed the Industrial Relations Department.

The Headquarters Department dealt with Parliamentary business, with general questions of policy in regard to labour matters, and with general questions of administration affecting the whole ministry. It advised the War Cabinet and other government departments on all matters affecting labour. Each week it submitted a report to the War Cabinet on the labour situation. The department was responsible for the formation of Joint Industrial Councils and Whitley Councils, and co-operated with and later took over from the Ministry of Reconstruction responsibility for Interim Industrial Reconstruction Committees. It was responsible for relations with trade unions and for dealing with industrial disputes.

Although the department ceased to exist in September 1918, files continued to be put in the HQ series until 1920. Joint Industrial Council (JIC) files were put in a separate JIC series in 1920 and later in the IR series (LAB 7/181-196). The department contained the Trade Boards Division but there are few references to trade boards in this series, the trade boards files being in the TB and related series (LAB 7/243-276).