Chen Liqing patted his head and remembered his advantages.

"Ocean, don't talk about it for now, I recently asked you to inquire about the political situation in the British mainland, how have you gathered?" Chen Liqing suddenly interrupted Xie Haiyang's report.

Xie Haiyang didn't expect Chen Liqing to suddenly ask this question, but then he sorted out his thoughts and nodded: "I have already roughly understood the overall situation in Britain according to the young master's instructions. ”

"It can be summed up in one word, chaos."

"What's the mess?" After coming to the UK for half a month, Chen Liqing was a little sluggish about all kinds of things happening in the UK because his language was never fluent.

"It's that workers go on strike almost every week because they feel that their bosses are paying them less." Xie Haiyang knew much more about this than Chen Liqing, and when he heard this, he began to say some of the information he had collected recently.

Chen Liqing listened and quickly understood why Britain could be called chaos now.

Before the middle of the 19th century, Britain was known as the factory of the world and was the most industrially developed country in the world. But after the 70s, the British economy slowed down. From 1870 to 1913, Britain's share of total industrial output in the world fell from 32% to 14%. In the 90s of the 19th century, it was surpassed by the United States, and at the beginning of the 20th century, it was surpassed by Germany, falling to the third place in the world.

There are two reasons why total industrial output has fallen so quickly: first, in the second industrial revolution, Britain started relatively late, and it was not very active in all aspects, and its development was very slow. In addition, the machines in the British factories were purchased and used before 1950, and by this period they had become old and their efficiency had greatly declined. The capitalists, on the other hand, were less concerned with the profitability of their factories and focused mainly on the income of the colonies, so that Britain gradually fell short of Germany and the United States in terms of basic industry from the 70s onwards.

Second, since British merchants tasted the sweetness of the colonies, a large amount of capital was invested in the construction of foreign colonies in order to obtain excess profits, resulting in the slow and even stagnant flow of capital in Britain. As a result, the wages of the workers in these factories became more and more cheap, and they were even exploited by the capitalists, so that since the 80s, the living standards of the workers have deteriorated, and the British workers under the pressure finally broke out in the workers' movement.

The 1886 protests of unemployed workers in London kicked off the strike. In 1888, a strike of more than 700 women workers at London's East End Match Factory broke out, winning the victory of increasing wages and improving working conditions; In 18**, the gas workers launched a massive strike struggle, forcing the capitalists to reduce their work, increase their wages, and in the course of the struggle, establish the Gas Workers' Union. It was the first union of unskilled workers in the history of the British labour movement. In the same year, Tom. Man and Elena. Marx and others led the London workers' strike. After more than four weeks of struggle, the capitalists finally accepted the conditions of the workers: an increase of six pence per hour, and no less than four hours of employment. Dock workers also formed unions. Through this series of struggles, new trade unions were formed.

By the time of the First World War, workers' wages were still falling, unemployment was increasing, and strikes were increasing year by year. In 1910, there was a new wave of strikes, with 515,000 workers on strike, which increased to 960,000 in 1911 and 1,460,000 in 1912. The development of the mass workers' movement urgently called for the formation of a political party capable of leading the struggle. In September 1911, a meeting of representatives of the left was held in Manchester, and a resolution was adopted to establish the "Socialist Party of England". But this party, under the influence of Handman, made the mistake of sectarianism and fear of the masses, and did not become a party with the surname of the masses. During this period, the workers' movement and the socialist movement in Britain, under the influence of bourgeoisism and trade unionism, had not yet embarked on the road of revolution.

In short, at this time, Britain was in the bud of some kind of revolution, and it only took a little bit of fire, and perhaps a new round of revolution would burn on British soil.

This situation, of course, can be called chaos.

Knowing this, Chen Liqing was taken aback, he didn't expect that Britain, the native land of the empire, would now be in chaos like this.

So, since these workers are now busy on strike and have no work, it is still difficult to recruit workers for Mao's farm?

Chen Liqing seems to have spotted some kind of sign behind this phenomenon.

……

London, a certain said.

Miner Andrew received another leaflet about the strike.

"Honey, I'm afraid we won't be able to go to work again today." Looking at the date and location of the notice on the flyer, Andrew turned around and waved helplessly to his wife in the yard: "The miners' association asked us to go to Trajafar on time at ten o'clock in the morning to demonstrate." ”

"God, this is the first strike of the month, Andrew, if you strike again, there will be no bread to eat at home." Andrew's wife was a chubby woman, and when she heard this, she put down the broom in her hand and looked at her with a worried expression.

Andrew's face became even more bitter when he heard this, and he waved the leaflet in his hand and said, "But what can I do?" Relying on the previous salary, we can't eat enough. ”

It's a fact, with Andrew's outrageously low salary, the family's quality of life is even a luxury to eat some beef every day.

Andrew's wife suddenly had no words, neither work, nor strikes, and this society made them a little desperate.

"Damn capitalists!"

Thinking of this difficult day, Andrew couldn't help but curse, and then had to say hello to his wife: "Wife, I'm going to **." ”

"Be careful." Her wife hurriedly advised.

"I know." Andrew waved his hand without looking back, leaving his wife at the gate of the yard with a worried face. This scene of separation was not unique to Andrew's family, and on this morning, all the miners received such leaflets. Although some of these miners were paid more than Andrew, they still did not think that they were underpaid, and they also followed the large army to Trajafal Square.

After a while, a group of absentees shouted for a strike and a wage increase appeared on the streets of London, and the number of absentees gradually increased from a few hundred at the beginning to several thousand. By the time the group gathered in Trajafal Square, there were almost 10,000 or 20,000 people.

For a time, London's Trajafal Square was shaking again, and the police and soldiers had to act urgently in the face of this large-scale strike. The Post, The Times and other media began to report on all aspects of the strike.

"This gentleman, I'm a reporter from The Times, where are you from and why are you on strike today?" Andrew was standing on the edge shouting loudly when he suddenly heard a voice.

As soon as he turned around, he saw a good-looking lady, his eyes couldn't help but light up, and then he said indignantly: "It's not the damn capitalists yet, they will only oppress our salary, our salary is no longer enough for us to eat bread every day, we ask for a raise!" ”

"Yes, a raise, we ask for a raise, we ask for a holiday!"

As soon as Andrew answered, some miners behind him couldn't help but shout, and for a while, the reporter was startled.

"Did you find it? Who are these workers who organized the demonstrations? At the same time, in a place where the crowds were not very crowded in the lively Trajafal Square, Chen Liqing stared at the lively scene, suddenly turned around, and happened to meet Xie Haiyang.

"I found out, this time the ** was organized by a person named Richard, and they are watching from the restaurant over there now, young master, do we need to meet them?" Xie Haiyang nodded, and then pointed, Chen Liqing followed Xie Haiyang's eyes and saw the window of a high-rise building.

"Well, let's go, let's take a look, this strike is not interesting except for the large number of people, I don't think it's interesting." Chen Liqing nodded, then took another look at the lively strike scene, and followed Xie Haiyang to withdraw from the lively strike scene. (To be continued.) )