I wish to touch upon one aspect of the matter which was raised by my hon. Friend the Member for Normanton (Mr. T. Smith) and also by the hon. Member for Cardigan (Mr. 0. Evans), and that is the relation of the new minimum wage to prices. If the new minimum wage had been the figure of 56s., which was first suggested by the Board, I think possibly, although I may be wrong, that there would have been need for an urgent appeal to my right hon. Friend to increase prices. With an increase to 60s. it is obvious that the prices of agricultural produce must be changed. If the existing prices were right with a national minimum of 48s. the present prices will not be right when the 60s. minimum becomes operative. I wish to make an appeal to the Minister that the revision of prices shall be generous and speedy. I make that appeal having in mind particularly those farmers, and there are a good many of them, who find the present prices insufficient to meet their production costs, still less to give them any profit. It is not going too far to say that many farmers who have been struggling on during the lean years have only just been able to keep their heads above water, and if they do not get reasonable prices now they will certainly go out.

My hon. Friend the Member for Normanton has referred to the difficulty which faces the Government in fixing these prices. If all farm land had the same productivity, if all was equally easily worked, if all farmers were equally skilled and if all could get the most modern machinery, it would be a comparatively easy matter to determine production costs with reasonable accuracy and to fix prices accordingly. But, as we all know, that is not the case. There are wide variations in the character of land. It varies as between county and county, between parish and parish and even between field and field. The man who is getting 30 per cent. or 50 per cent. less yield than his neighbour, owing to the character of his land and through no fault of his own, and who may have to employ extra labour because his land is difficult to work, has exactly the same production costs as his more fortunately placed neighbour. It is important that the position of such a man should not be overlooked. Then there are the strange and capricious climatic conditions in this country, which often turn what looks like being a profit into a loss. During the recent corn harvest farmers in some parts of the country were able to get in their crops in good condition and with very little diffi- culty. Elsewhere the harvest was long drawn out and crops were ruined. That is what makes it so difficult for those charged with the fixing of prices to arrive at just prices for all concerned. Therefore, I hope that when he considers the prices, in conjunction with his advisers, the Minister will be generous and will fix them at a level which will give help to the small man, the man who is cultivating difficult land, the man who has not got the facilities which the big farmer enjoys.

No one will deny that there are people engaged in agriculture to-day who are finding it a very profitable occupation indeed. Some of them will go so far as to admit it, and it is an interesting fact that some of the county committees when considering the suggestion of the Board that the minimum wage should be raised to 56s., proposed on their own initiative that it should be 60s., in some cases, I think, without any reservation as to prices. They may have had some ulterior motive in their minds in doing so, I do not know, but it is a fact that they made the suggestion. Any increase in prices will obviously provide men who are in a position under present conditions to pay wages on the basis of the 60s. minimum with extra money, but it must be remembered that those people are the exceptions. The great bulk of farmers are not making fortunes. Probably they are doing a great deal better than they were, but we have to remember that they had been doing very badly. I hope that my right hon. Friend will take into account that the money which the farmers who are doing really well will obtain will eventually come back to the Treasury in the form of Excess Profits Tax and that the improvement in agriculture generally will be reflected in the Income Tax returns, and I hope that he will be able to some extent to draw upon the money coming in from agriculture generally in order to meet the needs of the smaller men.

I feel that everyone is pleased that the minimum wage of the agricultural worker is to go up to 6os. In the past he has been penalised by the fact that in very many cases his employers have not been able to pay a better wage. The agricultural worker has done and is doing magnificent work. From the national point of view his work is just as important as that of the munition maker or the coal miner. I hope that we shall see an end of the idea that the wage of the agricultural worker is a sort of datum line and that wages in all other industries must be above it. That idea has prevailed for too long and it is high time it disappeared. We have to remember, also, that while his work is important he will not, even now, be getting paid at the same rate as the workers in other industries. In addition, he suffers other disadvantages. A recent disadvantage which has been added to all the others is that he now comes under the Essential Work Order and cannot leave agriculture to take up other employment, although he could easily obtain it on more lucrative terms. Again, he has no canteens or British Restaurants to which he can go to supplement his ration. He lives, also, far away from shops, and shares with all other residents in rural areas the unpleasant consequences which have followed the skimming of the countryside to meet the demands of the towns for eggs, milk, rabbits and other things which at one time were so plentiful. Therefore I hope that my right hon. Friend will see to it that all farmers, and in particular the small farmers, are put in a position to pay wages on the new minimum rate when it comes into operation, a rate of wages which I think all will agree is at least satisfactory.

If I am in Order, I should like to say a word about the wage-fixing machinery. I happen to be chairman of my county committee, and have watched the machinery in operation at close quarters. In effect, we now have two wage-fixing authorities, the Board and the county committees. This affords an excellent opportunity to those interested of playing off one authority against the other. I do not think they are to be blamed for doing that; I think they are to be congratulated on their skill, but it is not a satisfactory arrangement. I would like to illustrate my point by describing what has happened during the last few months. I think it was in June that the workers' representatives on the Board tabled a motion that the national minimum wage should be raised to 60s. The Board held a large number of meetings in July and August but was able to come to no decision. Finally, in September, a notice was issued on behalf of the Board stating that the appointed members thought that some increase in the national minimum was justified but that, before making any suggestion as to what the increase should be, they were awaiting further information which they expected would be available by the first week in November. The statement went on to say that the county committees were perfectly free to raise the county minima if they wished to do so, a fact of which the county committees were well aware.

While this was going on, the workers' representatives in the counties were tabling exactly the same motion for the consideration of the county committees. In the case of my county, Suffolk, that motion came to us in September. It was turned down in the first instance on the ground that, in the absence of fuller information, it was desirable to wait until a pronouncement had been made by the Board, in November, when they hoped to be in a position to decide. That decision met with the strongest disapproval in the county because several adjacent counties had raised their minima to 54s. or over. Then, Essex raised its minimum to 54s., and the position of Suffolk, completely surrounded by counties with higher minimums, became intolerable. When the application was renewed by the workers' side, the minimum was raised to 54s.

That illustrates what I mean when I say that there are two wage-fixing authorities and that it is unsatisfactory that the system should go on. I do not need to trouble the House with the details of the machinery for fixing the new national minimum wage. The machinery is complicated, and, on this occasion, as on the last, it is being very much rushed because, by Order in Council, the procedure is being shortened. I ask the Minister whether this complicated machinery cannot be simplified and whether he will put that object in the forefront of his post-war plans. Not only is it complicated, but it tends to overlapping and is, above all, liable to abuse. I am sure that a simpler system could be devised which would work very much better and, incidentally, would take away the responsibility which weighs upon the chairmen and the impartial members of the county committees. In the end, they have to take the decision on all major issues, because agreement between the two sides is almost impossible to obtain.