WAGES (REGULATION). (Hansard, 23 February 1921)

39. Colonel NEWMAN
asked the Minister of Labour whether it is a desire for economy that prevents him from, with the help of statistical experts who are not themselves civil servants, undertaking an inquiry into the cost of living which would place the wages of organised labour and the salaries of the civil servants on a scientific basis as far as they are varied by the cost of living; whether such an inquiry would cost more than £200,000; and whether, in view of the numbers who would be affected, such a sum would be saved many times over in the course of a few months?

§ Dr. MACNAMARA
The arrangements under which the wages of workpeople in various industries and services are regulated in accordance with the rise or fall in the cost of living, were made by agreement between representatives of the employers and of the workpeople concerned. I have no evidence of any general desire among the parties to those agreements for the replacement of the present index number by one calculated by a different method, and I think it unlikely that the work of such a Committee as is suggested by my hon. and gallant Friend would result in placing wages and salaries in those cases on a more scientific basis, as far as they are varied by the cost of living.

Colonel NEWMAN
Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that it is not only the salaries and wages of the working classes, but it is the salaries of the civil servants which are affected, and is he aware that the general public place no confidence whatever in these monthly figures of the Department?

§ Dr. MACNAMARA
I have heard the most unworthy suggestion—not from my hon. and gallant Friend—made that these figures are faked because they affect the salaries of those who have to prepare them. That, I think, is a suggestion which ought not to be made anywhere.

§ Lieut.-Colonel ARCHER-SHEE
Would it not be much better that these figures should be fixed by an independent committee and not by men who are beneficiaries?

Mr. J. JONES
Does that apply also to the officers in the Army and Navy who have had increases during the War?