Organisation for the Maintenance of Supplies

The Organisation for the Maintenance of Supplies was a British right-wing movement, established in 1925 to provide volunteers in the event of a general strike. During the General Strike of 1926, it was taken over by the government to provide vital services, such as transport and communications.

On "Red Friday", 31 July 1925, the government avoided a confrontation with the Miners Federation of Great Britain, which was expected to be followed by secondary industrial action by the railwaymen of the National Union of Railwaymen, and wider confrontation. However, as Stanley Baldwin said later, "we were not ready". The government had an emergency plan but inadequate means of implementing it. It thus established a Royal Commission and provided a subsidy to enable the mineowners to maintain the miners' existing wages and hours of work.

In early August, Home Secretary William Joynson-Hicks reported to the cabinet on the state of preparations, and his recommendations were approved, but the establishment of a volunteer service was deferred.

The OMS had its public origins in the letters page of The Times, where many were calling for the formation of a volunteer organisation to take over the jobs of striking workers, in the event of a general strike, which was widely feared by the conservative establishment at the time, as part of a 'communist plot'. The same page was used on 25 September 1925 by the Home Secretary to announce the formation of just such a group, the new OMS. Nevertheless, he admitted, on 1 October, that he had known of its inauguration for many weeks and that its promoters had consulted him. The government had no objection to it.

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