§ The Minister of Labour (Mr. Joseph Godber)With permission, I should like to make a statement.
The Report of the Court of Inquiry which I appointed under the chairmanship of the Rt. Hon. Sir Colin Pearson, to inquire into the causes and circumstances of tie recent dispute in the electricity supply industry, is being published as a Command Paper this morning. Copies of the Report are available in the Vote Office and have been given to the parties.
The Report identifies two underlying causes in the recent dispute: delay on the part of the electricity boards in putting forward and developing their status proposals; and breaches by the unions of the three-year agreement reached in January, 1963, and of the constitutional agreement in that they evaded the obligation to allow their difference with the boards to go to arbitration.
779 The Report commends the status scheme as a very worthy conception and one which both parties have accepted in principle as being in the overall best interest of the electricity boards, the employees and the consumers. The Report recommends that the two sides should resume negotiations on the scheme in an atmosphere of renewed vigour and purpose. I hope that they will do so.
I should like to thank Sir Colin Pearson and his colleagues for producing a most valuable and constructive Report.
§ Mr. GunterI am sure that the whole House will join with the Minister in hoping that there will be an immediate resumption of the negotiations now that clarification has been brought to a rather confused situation.