§ 56. Major Digbyasked the Minister of Agriculture if he will consider a revision ofthe wages of members of the W.L.A. to enable a girl who is living at home and paying her parents for her keep to be paid on the same basis as a girl who is living on the farm where she is employed.
§ The Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Thomas Williams)All members of the Women's Land Army are entitled to wages at not less than the minimum rates fixed by the Agricultural Wages Board. In a case where the employer provides a worker with board and lodging, he may reckon the value at not more than the amount prescribed for the purpose by the county agricultural wages committee and pay the worker only the balance of the minimum wage in cash. A girl living at home receives the minimum wage in full in cash, and what she pays her parents for her board and lodging is a private matter.
§ Major DigbyIs the Minister aware that girls living at home get about 5s. a week less because they have to pay Income Tax, while other girls with whom they work live in lodgings and get that much a week more?
§ Mr. WilliamsThe question of Income Tax is one for my right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer, and not for me.