Orders of the Day — Pay Increases (Crown Bedding Company)

Part of the debate – in the House of Commons at 12:00 am on 5 April 1967.

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Photo of Mr Roy Hattersley Mr Roy Hattersley , Birmingham Sparkbrook 12:00, 5 April 1967

The figure for overtime is something like 12 hours a week. [HON. MEMBERS: "Oh."] The figure is clear, it is obvious, and it in no way invalidates the proposition I am making. Their basic wage was in excess of what anyone can regard as that of the lowest paid worker. Their application was for an increase which in terms of extra money and a shorter working week amounted to an improvement in remuneration of something like 15 per cent., by any standard a substantial increase, and an increase which was far outside the norms laid down by Government policy.

I think that again, as a fortnight ago, it is important to remember that these applications for increases in wages and reductions of the working week were made on 13th December, after the publication of the White Paper on the Standstill, after the publication of the White Paper on the Period of Severe Restraint, and I have no doubt at all that the Transport and General Workers Union, described by the hon. Gentleman the Member for Ormskirk (Sir D. Glover) as one of the defenceless groups in the country against whom the Government were mounting an attack, knew very well that the claim was and would be a breach of the incomes policy. I have no doubt at all that the Transport and General Workers Union said, "This is a breach of the incomes policy, but we go ahead with it nevertheless." The argument has been advanced in the House that some breaches of the incomes policy have been made by mistake, but I have no doubt at all that on this occasion it was made intentionally and deliberately.

I must ask the hon. Member for Worthing the question which I have asked him and his colleagues on their Front Bench every time we have debated Orders like this. In that situation, assuming that they had an incomes policy at all, as I am constantly told they would have and once had, what would they have done? Would they at that point have said, "The incomes policy is only for the nonmilitant. The incomes policy is only for the voluntarily co-operative. The incomes policy is only for those who choose to comply, and anyone who does not comply may escape"? Perhaps the hon. Gentleman will have an opportunity of telling us what, in the face of this straightforward, obvious and overt challenge, he would have done in those circumstances.

The Government's attitude was clear and precise. Our obligation to our policy was to make an Order under Section 29 of the Prices and Incomes Act, and this had special significance in this case for the reasons which I want to outline.

The hon. Gentleman asked me whether the Order covered both the proposed increases in wages and the proposed reduction in the working week. There is no doubt at all that the Order covers both. There is equally, I think, no doubt at all that the existence of the prices and incomes policy and the existence of the reserve powers was not a contributory factor in the sort of industrial relations which operated in the firm between 13th December and the early weeks of January. The hon. Gentleman has put it to the House that the knowledge that the Government would intervene might in itself have encouraged the union to take action more precipitate than it would have chosen to do had it been able to negotiate freely without the reserve powers being there hanging over their heads. The union knew, I reiterate; it had read the Government's documents and could understand that paragraph 24 of the Standstill White Paper urged management and men to go on negotiating in the usual way. The incomes policy in no way precludes traditional negotiations—indeed, it encourages them—but only reminds the parities that the negotiations should be carried out in the light of the existence of the incomes policy.

Notwithstanding that, the rather precipitate step was taken by the union which produced a strike on 2nd January. Again I ask the hon. Member for Worthing what alternative he thinks the Government have in such a situation. Until then, the incomes policy is still voluntary. Until that moment, the company and the men are being urged voluntarily to accept wage limitation. It is not until industrial action is taken to make sure that the company refuses to accept the voluntary implications of the policy that the Order is made.

The Order was made to cover both sections of the new agreement—the increase in wages and the reduction in the working week. Clearly, the Order in relation to the wage increase must continue to operate until Part IV of the Act lapses on 11th August. The hon. Gentleman asked whether it was the Government's intention to "claw back", as he described it, the increase the men had obtained in excess of the incomes policy norm between the time the Order became operative and the time when the new rate was first paid.

I take issue with him on his term "claw back". I understand the necessity for the Opposition to describe Government policy in pejorative terms, but I would put it another way. The Government say that their obligation is to hold the incomes policy line to make sure that no body of men by militant action, by greater determination to flout the policy, obtain advantages over those who have accepted the policy voluntarily. Therefore, it is clearly Government policy to make sure that any increase obtained in excess of that policy is compensated for by a period of forced restraint, Thus, if the hon. Gentleman's question is whether the Government are equating the period of excess payment with the period during which the Order is in operation, the answer is, usually, "yes".

That is the only point which needs to be made about the increase in wages. There is a point of some substance about the proposed working week reduction. The hon. Gentleman was a little wrong in saying that the company had had to accept all the union's demands because fear of the incomes policy encouraged the men to insist on the acceptance of all their demands. I understand that the union originally asked for a two-hour reduction in the working week and finally accepted a reduction of one hour.

The important point here is that there may well be a claim that the Road Haulage Wages Act, 1938, which, before 20th July—the significant date—gave road haulage drivers of "A and B" licence vehicles a reduced working week by a Wages Regulation Order, applied to these men as well. Therefore they may be adjudged to have a statutory right to a reduced working week if they apply to the Industrial Court for the appropriate order on the ground that their working week should be reduced by one hour.

It may well be that the union will decide to take that claim to the Industrial Court and ask for a reduction in the working week of these men. I therefore make it clear that although, as it stands, the Order covers the reduction in the working week, if the union took that course and the Court ruled that the Wages Regulation Order should apply to these men as well and that their working week should therefore be reduced, my right hon. Friend would contemplate using his powers under Section 29(4,a) of the Act and notifying the management that, within the terms of the incomes policy, the working week could be reduced.