Board of Deputies of British Jews , Defence Committee , Trades Advisory Council Trades Advisory Council of British Jewry

In order to try and counter the activities of the British Union of Fascists and other bodies in the 1930s, in 1936 the Board of Deputies of British Jews, representing the Anglo-Jewish community, created a Co-ordinating Committee (for defence measures), which became the Defence Committee, concerning itself with social, political and economic matters in which anti-Semitism played a part. As well as addressing defamatory statements, its work included investigating periodic complaints about economic discrimination. In 1938 an ad hoc committee, known as the Trades Advisory Council, was set up to advise the Defence Committee on trade practices and related matters. It met infrequently until the outbreak of war in 1939. In 1940 it was reconstituted and a Secretariat appointed. It continued as an ad hoc committee, but in 1941 adopted a constitution as a democratic organisation based on a membership encompassing Jewish traders, industrialists and professional men. This Trades Advisory Council of British Jewry, generally known as the Trades Advisory Council (TAC), continued under the auspices of the Board of Deputies of British Jews. The TAC aimed to strengthen goodwill in industry and commerce and to maintain standards of commercial integrity, and dealt with all questions involving Jews in trade and industry, concerning itself especially with removing the causes of friction between Jewish and non-Jewish manufacturers, merchants and traders, and also with relations between employer and employees, labour conditions and opportunities, refugees, discrimination against Jews by employers, insurance companies or trade organisations, and irregularities and complaints involving Jews and non-Jews, including misrepresentation in trade advertisements and defamatory statements in newspapers. It collected and disseminated information, studied legislation and administrative measures affecting its concerns, liaised with other trade organisations, and arbitrated in commercial disputes where one or both parties were Jews. The TAC comprised a Secretariat; a National Administrative Council and Area Councils; Sections for various trades; and Committees including Statistical, Financial, Membership, Disciplinary, and Refugee Traders. It had premises initially at 148 Leadenhall Street, London, and later its head office was at 280 Euston Road, London NW1. From 1940 its General Secretary was the Labour politician Maurice Orbach.