PRICES AND INCOMES (TRANSPORT DRIVERS)

HC Deb 19 April 1967 vol 745 cc725-63

9.45 p.m.

Mr. Terence L. Higgins (Worthing)

I beg to move, That an humble Address be presented to Her Majesty, praying that the Temporary Restrictions on Pay Increases (20th July 1966 Levels) (No. 6) Order 1967 (S.I., 1967, No. 515), dated 39th March 1967, a copy of which was laid before this House on 30th March, be annulled. This Prayer is yet another in the series which we have laid against the Government's prices and incomes policy. Like the others which have gone before, it is an Order made under Part IV of the Prices and Incomes Act. It seeks to enforce the Government's policy by statutory control and, like the other Orders, it involves the element of compulsion and intimidation to which we on this side and hon. Members in all parts of the House are rigorously opposed.

It is clear that, despite counter-attractions earlier in the evening, these Orders are attracting more and more attention. It is also clear that, if the Government proceed to introduce a new Act reinforcing Part II of the Prices and Incomes Act, we shall see a constant succession of Orders similar to this which again will require very close Parliamentary scrutiny.

This is the eleventh wages Order which the House has considered, and it covers a somewhat larger group of people than those which have been covered by previous Orders. It affects in all some 450 drivers who are employed by 17 car delivery firms. Some 250 to 300 of those drivers are concerned with driving transporters which carry motor vehicles from the factory to the distribution network. In addition, there are some 200 or so plate drivers who actually deliver new cars.

Before I come to outline the history of this case, perhaps I should stress that it would be quite wrong for hon. Gentlemen opposite to suggest that there is anything hypocritical about the attitude of my right hon. and hon. Friends either to the Government's prices and incomes policy or their attitude to the trade union movement.

Mr. Speaker, classical scholars like yourself may have heard hypocrisy described as Government by horses. I do not think that that is so, but, be it so or not, we are against both hypocrisy and against Government by horses, trade union or otherwise.

The position which we take is quite clear. We are against the Order because it involves the element of compulsion, because it is grossly unfair, and because the policy as a whole is likely to prove unworkable.

While the Government seek to give the impression of being tough with the unions, we believe that that is illusory and that what is really needed is something more fundamental by way of trade union law reform, and that we have set out in our Manifesto—

Mr. J. J. Mendelson (Penistone)

I can well understand the hon. Member for Worthing (Mr. Higgins) starting off with a defensive statement about hypocrisy, but he ought to go further and remind the House that the kind of reforms which his Party suggested would have destroyed the freedom of the trade union movement very effectively.

Mr. Higgins

We could not disagree more—[Interruption.] We could not—[Interruption.]

Mr. Speaker

Order. A Parliamentary intervention by one hon. Gentleman to another is all right. Mere noise however is no contribution.

Mr. Higgins

I was saying that we could not disagree more with the hon. Gentleman. We feel that the real threat to the trade union movement and to the basis of industrial relations is the kind of action being taken under this Order.

Mr. Robert Maxwell (Buckingham)

Humbug.

Mr. Higgins

The framework which we suggest would ensure that the trade union movement was kept up to date, and that would be in the interests of all sections of the community and both sides of industrial relations.

I turn to the 450 members of the Transport and General Workers Union against whom this Order is made. In many ways, they are led by the former right hon. Member for Nuneaton, Mr. Frank Cousins. It has become clear from the Orders which we have been considering that the attitude of the Government has been very much to select those unions which are most militant, in the hope, possibly, of intimidating others who may take a similar line. As such, the Transport and General Workers Union is in much the same position as Admiral Byng. They are an ideal target for the Government to attack pour encourager les autres. This, I think, is very much the attitude which the Government have been taking on this Order.

If we turn to the details of this case, we find that it is somewhat more complicated than those of the earlier cases which we have considered, but, like them, it raises important points of principle which I shall discuss as soon as I have had an opportunity of outlining the case.

I understand that the earnings of the transport drivers whom we are considering average between £18 and £22 a week for a 60-hour week, with an 11-hour day, calculated on estimated journey time. In many cases the journey may take less than that, but the payment is on that basis. The pay is calculated on this basic rate. In the case of Birmingham transporter drivers taking a six-car load, this would be about £17 16s. for the guaranteed week, whether they work or not. The "platers," on the other hand, the deliverers of individual cars, are paid a somewhat lower rate, and may get only £12 to £13 a week basic.

I think that the case which we have to consider really involves four wage claims, because this sets the framework in which the claims which are covered by this Order are made. Until 1963 there were a variety of bonus payments for the drivers. These included payment for the carriage of return loads. If, for example, a driver delivered cars to London, he might take a return load of imported cars, and in return for this he received a series of "plus payments." In 1963 these were integrated in return for a substantial pay increase, but in 1965 the union again asked for plus payments, and after a strike it was agreed to accept a further increase. Those are the two agreements which set the framework of the agreement now covered by this Order.

On 19th May, 1966, a fresh agreement was made of 3d. extra per hour for the transport drivers and for platers, a cut in hours from 42 to 41 for transporters, and the establishment of a 42-hour week for those who had been covered by the previous platers' agreement. In January, 1967 the firms concerned—there were 17 in all—withheld the increase because it appeared to be in conflict with the Government's prices and incomes policy and not unnaturally the chairman of the employers of the group of companies covered by this Order wrote to the Minister of Labour asking for advice. He was told that the amount should not be paid. Notice here a distinction to which I shall return; the Minister said it should not be paid, rather than it must not be paid.

At that point the union began to exert pressure on one firm, and said that its members would not carry return goods. This put the firm in a difficult position, because its competitors were not being affected in the same way. As a result it was forced to give way, and it was therefore in conflict with what the Government said should not be done.

After this a further claim was made in addition to the claim which was made in May 1966, which should have been paid in January 1967. This was an additional claim made in February, 1967, which the workers put forward for an extra 3d. an hour. As a result of this and the May, 1966, claim the First Secretary made the Order which we are now considering. This forbids the firms to pay more than was being paid for similar work before 20th July last year, so that effectively the Order covers both the agreement made in May of last year and the subsequent one made in February of this year.

Representations against the Order were made both by the T. & G.W.U. and by individual firms, but the Order was confirmed, and as one can see it came into operation on 31st March. As a result of this the union announced that the agreement which it had made last year, and which was due to come into force at the beginning of this year, was at an end. The union maintained that it was a productivity agreement, and therefore it was not necessary for its members to carry return loads if the rest of the agreement, namely an increase in the amount paid, had been stopped by the Government. This, too, raises a point of principle to which I shall turn.

In addition to refusing to carry return loads, the union also acted on the suggestion that people returning from London should not use their season tickets, but should be paid the full single fare, thereby obtaining a certain amount of extra remuneration which they would not otherwise obtain—because very often they return by getting lifts, or by going hack in groups. After this, the chairman of the employers' group asked the Minister what action he proposed to take, and, in particular, whether he proposed to implement that part of the Prices and Incomes Act which I well recall our debating in Standing Committee, namely, that part which said that if any union brought pressure on the employers who were subject to an Order to get them to break the Government's policy, the union itself would be subject to severe penalties. This provision is to be found in Section 16(4) which says: If any trade union or other person takes, or threatens to take, any action, and in particular any action by way of taking part, or persuading others to take part, in a strike, with a view to compel, induce or influence any employer to implement an award or settlement in respect of employment … when the implementation of that award is forbidden under the foregoing section of … this Act, he shall be liable … to a fine"— of £100, or, if it goes to a higher court, of £500.

That sets the general background. I apologise to the House for spelling it out in some detail, but, as with similar Orders, it is important that we should be quite clear about the factual basis. No doubt the Parliamentary Secretary, whom I am glad to see here to reply again this evening, will correct me if I have made any statements which are not true statements of the position and no doubt he will add to them if he feels that additions are relevant.

The whole framework of this discussion raises a number of very important questions. The first which needs to be established is whether the agreement covered by the Order is a productivity agreement. When we were in Committee on the Prices and Incomes Act, we discussed at great length the distinction between a productivity agreement which was genuine and one which was a pseudo- productivity agreement designed merely to get round the Government's prices and incomes policy. At that time, the Government were not prepared to accept that any productivity agreement was justification for a wage increase. But since then their attitude seems to have changed somewhat, although we are not absolutely clear what they mean by a productivity agreement.

There is a distinction between the attitude of the employers and that of the union. The union is clearly asserting that this is a productivity agreement. If the payment due under the agreement is not made, then the union would not expect to make return journeys or to use season tickets and so on. In contrast with this, the employers assert that this was not a productivity agreement, but simply a straight agreement reached last May for a pay increase in January of this year, and, moreover, that similar productivity agreements were negotiated in 1963.

In other words, what the employers are asserting is that effectively the rule book has been "bought" twice. They argue that they bought the rule book as far as return journeys were concerned back in 1963. In effect, they say, the union is now arguing that the employers must buy back the same set of restrictive agreements a second time, that is to say, the refusal to carry return loads or use season tickets and so on.

I hope that we shall have a clear statement from the Parliamentary Secretary saying, first, whether he regards this as a productivity agreement, and, secondly, whether he thinks that it is a phoney productivity agreement, that the employers are being asked to settle up a second time and that, therefore, the Order in this case does not affect a productivity agreement. There has been considerable correspondence about this.

The second major question is whether the union is taking industrial action within the meaning of the Section which I quoted. Does the Parliamentary Secretary feel that the union is trying to induce or influence or compel the employers to break the prices and incomes policy, or that the unions' refusal to work return loads or use season tickets constitutes such action? I understand that there have been a number of go-slows also as a result of the Government's freeze, which were covered in the Press about 2nd April this year. Does he feel that that go-slow constitutes industrial action within the meaning of the Section? If so, it is relevant to ask what action the Government propose.

It would not be legitimate for him to say that we are now urging the Government to do what everyone in Committee agreed would be bad—taking Government action against a union and taking it to court. The essential point is that the Government's policy must be regarded as a whole. It is no good their saying, "We do not want to take action against the unions", and at the same time that they are prepared to take action like that in the Order.

Once the Government undertake such an absurd policy as this, it is essential that they should face the consequences and behave equitably to employers and employees alike. We have a right to ask what the position is when some of the workers covered by an Order may be sacked and then re-engaged on a different basis. This was a theoretical question which we discussed in Committee which has now come into practice.

Some of the employers covered by the Order have said that they intend to dismiss some of their workers who work on the Birmingham scale—who are covered by the Order and to whom they cannot, therefore, give additional payments—and they propose to re-employ them as Coventry workers on a different scale. This will give the drivers concerned a higher remuneration than if the Government's freeze policy were fully implemented. This development has not happened over any previous Order. The police draughtsmen case was similar, but this development is new.

If these employers do take this action, what do the Government propose? What is the purpose of a wage freeze Order like this, if, instead of keeping prices and costs down, it raises them? The extraordinary situation is that, by the Government's imposition of the Order, industrial relations have considerably deteriorated in these firms. Moreover, both the "platers" and transporters are refusing to take return loads and use their season tickets.

Second, instead of being frozen by the Order, the overall cost structure has been raised. This is absurd, because it defeats the Government's purpose. Is it sensible for the Government to ask us to approve Orders like this if the blatant effect is not to lower industrial costs but to raise them and, therefore, to raise the price to the consumer?

An interesting point on costs side has come up in the course of the exchanges between the two sides of the industry. It is alleged that normally the firms include in their prices an amount which covers the full second-class fare. If this is so, I trust that the Minister will examine the charges involved, particularly when firms normally employ a delivered price system which many people would regard as a restrictive trade practice. I ask this question in deference to the hon. Member for Penistone (Mr. Mendelson), because we must consider both parts of the problem and not attempt to take sides. One must be concerned with the exact balance that exists in industrial relations and the fact that the Government's action is having precisely the reverse effect it was intended to have. Indeed, there has been a considerable deterioration in industrial relations in this industry.

My hon. Friends and I have consistently maintained when discussing Orders of this type that the Government's policy is not fair. This seems to be particularly so in this case because I understand that similar firms which are doing exactly the same job are not covered by the Order. The workers in those firms will, therefore, get an increase whereas those covered by the Order will not.

What I have said proves that, even in the small, as against the whole, the Government's policy is unfair. It is also unfair in the whole because it tends to differentiate between organised labour and those in occupations which are not represented by organised trade unions. Many workers in the latter group tend to escape the effects of the freeze.

Mr. William Price (Rugby)

The hon. Gentleman appears to have uncovered a virtue in these Orders which I did not know existed. He has argued that the Government are picking on militant and organised labour. Would not he agree that that is a virtue compared with the record of the Opposition which, when in Government, always picked on the weakest?

Mr. Higgins

I have made it clear that we are opposed to the policy lock, stock and barrel. We would not differentiate in the way in which the Government are differentiating. The trouble is that the Government are picking on the strong unions as well as some of the others and are intimidating them while those who are not represented by unions are often completely escaping the freeze. It therefore cannot be said that the Government's policy is either equitable or fair. For this reason I hope that my hon. Friends will join me in voting against the Government tonight.

10.9 p.m.

Mr. J. J. Mendelson (Penistone)

My hon. Friend the Joint Parliamentary Secretary is in his place on the Front Bench tonight and will, once more, be replying to a debate on this subject. The only other Government official on that Bench is a representative of the Whips' Office who comes from Yorkshire. The Parliamentary Secretary must again attempt to defend the indefensible. I wish that my right hon. Friend the Chancellor were in his place to reply, because the Parliamentary Secretary has very little to do with either the policy or the Order. Nor has my right hon. Friend the Minister of Labour.

We are going through these unreasonable debates because of certain actions which the Chancellor thought it fit to take to prove internationally that he was adopting a tough attitude towards wage increases. That is the real basis of the debate. I shall endeavour to say nothing which might in any way reflect on the part the Parliamentary Secretary has played in this business. He did not make the policy, although he must defend the indefensible on behalf of somebody else.

The history of the Order is mportant and, without going back too far, I wish to establish one point which will commend itself to the House. The union involved, having gone through a difficult history in this part of industry, had, as a result of a report submitted by Mr. Scamp in December, 1965, withdrawn a higher wage claim and re-submitted a very modest one.

I do not know whether my hon. Friend the Parliamentary Secretary is fully cognisant of these facts. If he does not mind my saying so, from discussions that took place between him, my right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster, the people involved in the application of the Order and trade union representatives, I got the impression that my right hon. Friend and my hon. Friend did not know of many of these facts until very recently and had to be brought up to date by those on the trade union side. If this is so it indicates why this policy is so difficult of application and needs so much improvisation that it makes the job of government in these matters well nigh impossible, or at least extremely difficult. I am glad to see that I have my hon. Friend's agreement on that point.

The more reasonable claim was submitted. I regard it as a virtue on the part of the trade union people that they took due notice of the Scamp Report because if there is to be rationalisation of industrial relations notice must be taken of such reports whether or not all their conclusions are agreed. The negotiations started, but I want to put on record that this has not been a business that started a few hours before 20th July, 1966. This negotiation has a very long history, and the resubmission of the claim on a more modest basis does not mean that the earlier expectations had been wiped out. We know how frustrating it can be in industrial relations when, after there has been a period of delay, for one reason there is another period of delay for another reason.

The car delivery service went into a period of difficulty arising out of the unreasonable policy of an agency that represented employers, and of a number of the employers themselves in their handling of redundancy policy. That led to a strike which lasted three months and created a good deal of difficulty in this part of the industry. After the strike had been settled, the resubmitted more modest claim was negotiated and an agreement was reached.

The second point I wish to establish, because it is of practical importance, is that the agreement contained a genuine productivity element. All the discussions that have gone on for such a long time in this House, and in the country between the General Council of the T.U.C. and the Government, have always fastened on the factor of a genuine productivity agreement. I remember my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister coining the phrase about a copper-bottomed productivity agreement—he is fond of these metallic phrases and used one for this discussion. I submit that in this case we had a steel-bottomed productivity agreement. Coming, as I do, from a steel constituency, I could not put it more strongly than that.

It was an agreement to speed things up by delivering at both ends. I will not go into too much detail, because the details are well known to those who have gone through this business. That saved time, and the employers are on record as saying that it saved money for the firms involved. We have the elements of a productivity agreement that is precious to the men in this part of the industry, precious to the employers from their own point of view, and equally important from the point of view of the nation because it means saving time, saving effort and doing the job more efficiently and effectively. It is this agreement which the Government has set aside. I have always thought that when the industrial historian writes the history of this particular period on behalf of my right hon. Friends and the part which the Minister of Labour had to play in unmaking agreements freely agreed between the two sides of industry, the productivity element will be written down as something beyond comprehension.

The particular group agency has broken up and there are individual arrangements between the firms and the men involved. One very important firm has given notice to a number of men and is now re-employing them and paying them at the higher rate. The return journey is taking place, and in this part of the work the productivity agreement is being implemented to everyone's delight. There is an important firm owned by the nationalised part of the industry, Furnaces Limited, which has vigorously protested to the Government because it is inhibited from being able to honour the agreement, and this puts the firm at a serious disadvantage compared with other firms.

Every day new anomalies are added to this incomprehensible situation. Every day new difficulties of the Government's own making appear. Purely on the basis of sound industrial and economic sense, having said that I do not hold my hon. Friend responsible for the policy, I put it to him that the time has come for the Minister of Labour—the head of his Department—to bang the table and call a halt. He is in the Cabinet charged with the particular responsibility of watching over industrial relations. Here is an Order which does harm to good industrial relations, in addition to all the other difficulties I have described. Instead of merely going on criticising and making spurious demands for the Order to be withdrawn—which my hon. Friend has no authority to do tonight—I ask, has not the time come for the Minister of Labour to use his policy to call a halt?

There are involved in this Order a number of men who, when they were told that the productivity agreement could not operate and that they would not be paid the agreed higher rate, took no industrial action and did nothing which could be regarded as in the slightest way illegal. All they did was to say to their employers, "If you are not honouring that part of the agreement which results in a return journey, we are not making the return journey". While that is strictly legal, how can a Government sensibly assume responsibility for a situation which compels a group of working people who had agreed through their negotiating machinery to do the job in an efficient way to say that they will not do it because they will not be paid for it?

I say this more in sorrow than in anger. Sometime soon the day will come when we shall do away with all these nonsensical Orders. There are more people in the Government now who do not care to admit publicly that this policy does not make sense. I do not want to add more to what I said at the beginning about the attitude of the Opposition, but it is passing strange how the Opposition has used this situation in recent election events.

Mr. Speaker

Whether in sorrow or in anger, the hon. Member must keep to the Order and talk about the Order.

Mr. Mendelson

I agree that I must always keep in order, but as the hon. Member for Worthing (Mr. Higgins) was given a certain amount of limited free rein to make a few general remarks, I thought it churlish not to make any response.

Mr. Speaker

I thought I had given the hon. Member a similar opportunity.

Mr. Mendelson

All right. In that case, as I am always guided by your Ruling, Mr. Speaker, I say more in sorrow than in anger that, whatever attitude others adopt, the final decision will be between the trade union movement and supporters of Her Majesty's Government and our Government. If the Government persist in going on with Orders of this kind, they will create an atmosphere among those directly involved—in this case reasonable men who have acted very reasonably—and among others which will make the whole idea of an incomes policy something absurd, baroque and ridiculous. That will be a high price to pay for persisting with Orders of this kind. I ask the Government to think again.

Sir John Vaughan-Morgan (Reigate)

Before the hon. Gentleman sits down, may I put this to him? Will not he say this much, that the Government are encouraged to proceed in their policies by the number of those of their supporters on the back benches who speak against these Orders but who do not vote against them?

Mr. Speaker

Order. We cannot have a general debate on prices and incomes policy or on the attitude of members of Her Majesty's Government. We are discussing an Order.

10.21 p.m.

Mr. John Biffen (Oswestry)

I would agree with much that the hon. Member for Penistone (Mr. Mendelson) said, though he will appreciate that I would not endorse his peroration; but, as I understood that that was in some difficulty of running without order, I think that he will in any case be anxious that I do not seek to follow him in that.

I want to confine my remarks to the Schedule, "Description of remuneration for work", to the Order. It contains three words which have special significance and which the House should dwell upon in seeking to use this occasion to get some clarification of Government policy. The words are "remuneration", "work" and "employees".

The first point about remuneration is that these car delivery drivers were paid in cash. Their increase was in cash. This is a matter of some significance, because it is wrong to assume that remuneration is entirely in cash for many employees. We know that often it is not. There are other forms of benefits. However, those other forms of benefits do not attract the same rigorous attention of the Ministry of Labour as do increases in cash.

I am encouraged to think that this is so by an article which appeared in the Financial Times a little while ago entitled Stresses and strains of the salary freeze and written by a person called Elspeth Ganguin, who said this: I heard of instances where staff has been discharged and been re-engaged at higher salaries. 'It now remains to be seen how the fringe benefit side can be worked out', my informant added. I have also been told of cases where managers are agreeing amongst themselves to swop employees—'like on the football market'. And the London Chamber of Commerce, as it cannot give rises, is supplying its staff with luncheon vouchers instead. Only a few days ago on the "Today" programme broadcast by the B.B.C. mention was made of the case of an engineering company in the North-West of England, which was giving trading stamps, some sort of bonus—

Mr. Speaker

Order. The hon. Gentleman will come to the Order about which we are talking, I hope.

Mr. Biffen

Yes, indeed. My point is simply this. In these instances, where the payments were in some less tangible form than cash, no action was taken. The misdemeanour of the transport delivery men whose remuneration we are discussing was primarily that this was a cash transaction. This is not just a theoretical point. When one considers the movement of salaries, particularly executive salaries, the remuneration not in terms of cash is of considerable significance. That is the first observation I make on the arbitrariness of the Order.

My second point relates to the word "work". My hon. Friend the Member for Worthing (Mr. Higgins) asked several questions about whether the work which the car delivery men do could be described as proceeding from a genuine productivity agreement, and the hon. Member for Penistone (Mr. Mendelson) elaborated that argument with great force.

What was the procedure adopted on this Order? The proposal to increase incomes, or to increase remuneration, if we are to use the phraseology of the Order, was notified to the Ministry of Labour by the employers. Some of us may have the impression that at the Ministry of Labour there is a team of highly skilled people able to open the post each morning, examine these notifications, and come to a Solomon-like judgment, considering that in those instances at least one need not refer them to Mr. Aubrey Jones.

The reality is very different. On 17th April, I inquired of the Minister of Labour how many proposals for increasing the remuneration of employees had been received, and the Joint Parliamentary Secretary replied: In the last five months the Ministry of Labour has received well over 8,000 inquiries about the interpretation of the Government's incomes policy."—[OFFICIAL REPORT. 17th April, 1967; Vol. 745, c. 15.] That number in five months is 1,600 a month, 400 a week, or 80 a day.

Mr. Speaker

Order. We cannot discuss the Government's prices and incomes policy in other fields but in relation only to the circumstances bound up with the Order which the hon. Gentleman knows we are discussing.

Mr. Biffen

Yes, Mr. Speaker. The House is entitled to know how this case was picked out. I have established that there are, on average, 80 a day coming in. They are the 80 about which the Government knows something, and there are legion about which they know nothing. For example, there was the case of the Morgan Crucible Company, of which my hon. Friend the Member for Reigate (Sir John Vaughan-Morgan) would be only too glad to inform the House. It would be interesting to know by what criterion or judgment someone sitting at the Ministry of Labour was able to say that this increase, out of the 80 notifications, had to be stopped.

I doubt that it lies in the ability of anyone to ascertain with precision what a productivity deal is. People much more closely connected with industry than we ourselves are most reluctant to make judgments of that kind. It was certainly the view of the general secre- tary of the Transport and General Workers' Union that there had been some kind of productivity deal, because, on 3rd April, he was quoted in the Financial Times as having said: I am not going to have members of my organisation confidence-tricked into doing something and then not getting paid". We should like to know from the Parliamentary Secretary whether he repudiates the implications clearly contained in those remarks of Mr. Frank Cousins or whether Mr. Cousins was right in saying that there had been a productivity deal of some kind but it was not, in the opinion of the Ministry of Labour, copper-bottomed enough.

My third point concerns the word "employees". I asked a Question of the Joint Parliamentary Secretary a little while ago—its relevance was emphasised by the hon. Member for Rugby (Mr. William Price)—about how many employees whose pay we discuss under these Orders are members of trade unions. The Joint Parliamentary Secretary could not give me the answer; he said it was not possible. But I ask him now on this Order whether we can be told how many of the employees covered by it are thought to be members of a trade union. If he cannot give us this information, it seems to me an extraordinary deficiency on the part of the statistical services that ought to be available to his Ministry and to the House.

This is one more of a series of Orders that we are asked to pass, and it seems to me that anyone who has hoped for the emergence from these debates of any kind of principles governing the Government's prices and incomes policy must be sorely disappointed. There is only one words to describe the Orders—capricious. What the House is invited willingly to endorse as capricious it will ultimately be asked to endorse as tyrannous.

10.31 p.m.

Mr. Stanley Orme (Salford, West)

Following what the hon. Member for Oswestry (Mr. Biffen) has said, that this is a continuing series of Orders that have come before the House since the implementation of Part IV of the Prices and Incomes Act, it appears that a group of people whom we know very well regularly meet at this hour about twice a week to debate these Orders. One wonders just how long it will go on and what relevance it has to the economy of the country and the prices and incomes policy.

In my opinion, we have some very bad Orders before the House, and also some pretty grim ones. This is one of the worst Orders that we have had. It is significant that it has arisen out of industrial action—it is one of the few Orders that have done so—taken by members of the Transport and General Workers Union. The action was taken against the L.G.D.A., an association covering a great many of these drivers, though by no means all of them. The association has a bad industrial relations record. In fact, the Transport and General Workers Union has had to fight exceedingly hard to maintain organisation and get that employers' organisation to see sense.

Following the dispute that took place—as my hon. Friend the Member for Penistone (Mr. Mendelson) said, it lasted for many weeks—an agreement was finally arrived at. Looking at the record of the firm, looking at the problems that the dispute created inside the car industry and looking at the problems that Mr. Scamp has to face in regard to industrial relations inside the car industry, it appears to some of my hon. Friends and myself absolutely idiotic that the Ministry of Labour should pick out this firm and agreement for an Order. We can logically ask, as has already been done, how do the Government arrive at these Orders? What yardstick do they use for choosing a particular firm or group of workers as against another? It would appear from the Order that we are moving from some of the smaller unions to the larger ones. There is likely to be an Order concerning a dispute in Scotland, and we might discuss it at a later date. That will have more serious undertones than ever.

My right hon. Friend the Member for Newton (Mr. Frederick Lee), who is the Duchy of Lancaster, has some responsibility for this sort of Order. He took part in negotiations with the firm, and knew something of the conditions relating to the agreement. The Government were fully aware of the serious situation in the cat industry.

What worries me is that the Ministry of Labour, which it would appear is responsible for answering for the Orders—we are familiar with my hon. Friend the Parliamentary Secretary who appears here regularly to deal with them—[Interruption.]—I say to hon. Members opposite that this is not a laughing matter. I can hear that some of them do not take these matters seriously. We do. So do some hon. Members opposite, but not all.

The Ministry of Labour should be getting on with the job of industrial relations and bringing about the type of atmosphere needed in industry. It seems to be working against that by being responsible for introducing Orders such as this and having them implemented. That does not make sense to the workers, and it does not help get a sensible economic policy and sensible prices and incomes policy. That is the key issue as we see it.

Mr. F. A. Burden (Gillingham)

The hon. Gentleman referred to hon. Members on these benches. I remind him that hon. Members on this side of the House vote against the Orders. Members opposite speak against the Orders but support them.

Mr. Orme

Facetious remarks like that do not carry any weight with us.

The hon. Member for Worthing (Mr. Higgins), has introduced debates on some of the Orders lucidly on a number of occasions. I felt that his mask slipped a little tonight when he began, and we shall take note of the points he raised.

On the Order and the way it was arrived at concerning this payment, I ask my hon. Friend, "What about the thousands of tax-free travel allowances now being paid by industry?" Many thousands of £s are paid by all types of employers, as he is aware, particularly in office and similar work. Those agreements are being made not only to get round the Prices and Incomes Act but also in relation to tax payments.

Mr. John Peyton (Yeovil)

On a point of order. Could the hon. Gentleman indicate where and how the Order covers tax-free travel allowances for anybody?

Mr. Deputy Speaker (Mr. Sydney Irving)

Unless the hon. Member is relating it to the Order, it is out of order. I thought that he was trying to develop a point and so I did not intervene. But he must come to the Order.

Mr. Orme

The point had already been made, Mr. Deputy Speaker, and I felt that it was germane. I appreciate the difficulty in trying to raise relevant issues on a narrowly-drawn Order like this, and, of course, we do not always get much help from hon. Members opposite, However, we will do our best.

We have had ten Orders on wages and one on prices. We were told that when we got past the turn of the year we would start to see an end to this sort of thing, with Part IV of the Act lapsing in July. We were told that we would be getting—

Mr. Deputy Speaker

Order. The hon. Gentleman is really now getting into a wider debate than is admissible. He must stick to the situation leading to the Order and the Order itself.

Mr. Orme

This Order has been made in relation to a productivity agreement arising out of industrial conditions and negotiations and genuinely arrived at. This union could have taken very strong militant action to enforce the agreement and is still free to do so if it wishes. Such action would then be an open challenge to Government policy. It is time the Government recognised that this and other such Orders are irrelevant to the basic situation we are faced with and I urge them even at this late hour to withdraw the Order.

10.41 p.m.

Mr. John Peyton (Yeovil)

I do not suppose that the hon. Member for Salford, West (Mr. Orme) will entirely welcome my support or even be grateful for it, but I think that his words about Government interference in the details of industrial relations were justified and I congratulate him. I want to welcome also the words he used about this Order. He said that we have had bad, very bad and some grim Orders, and that this is one of the worst. Again I see no reason to quarrel with that description.

I do not always find myself in warm agreement with the hon. Member for Penistone (Mr. Mendelson), but tonight he said that it was the job of his poor hon. Friend the Joint Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Labour to defend the indefensible on behalf of someone else. I agree with that as a succinct summary of the situation. The Joint Parliamentary Secretary is here like a sacrificial lamb to do the duty of someone else. A simple minded person, looking at this Order and seeing on it the name "Michael Stewart, First Secretary of State and Secretary of State for Economic Affairs," might be astonished to find that the First Secretary of State is not here to defend his own rather scruffy handiwork.

I wonder whether the judgment of my right hon. Friends on the Opposition Front Bench is correct in more or less limiting these debates, which are on one of the most important subjects facing the country, to this late hour at night. Why do we not have a Supply Day to discuss this sort of Order at an appropriate hour when more hon. Members can speak and take an interest?

I am obliged to remind the hon. Member for Salford, West that as yet the right hon. Member for Newton (Mr. Frederick Lee) is only Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster and not the Duchy of Lancaster. No doubt that will come.

I have two main complaints against the Order—it is unfair and it is stupid. It is unfair in the sense that some firms involved are not included in the Order. This gives them a quite uncovenanted and unearned advantage. Anyone who is not covered by the Order is given a splendid opportunity to take the workers and the business of those who are. To me, this is a first-class example of the invidious situation into which one inevitably gets once individual firms are named in the course of legislative proceedings.

I come to my second point of attack, namely that the Order is plainly stupid. It produces, as my hon. Friend the Member for Worthing (Mr. Higgins) made very clear, inefficiency. My hon. Friend the Member for Oswestry (Mr. Biffen) touched on this, too. What was meant by all those policies, those splendid speeches which we had from Socialist spokesmen saying that we were to share in a time of efficiency, of dynamism and of cutting out wastefulness? Here we have an Order which is directly responsible for raising the costs of the industry and for producing wasteful and unnecessary investment.

I am deeply sorry for the Parliamentary Secretary who has somehow to defend the lunatic lucubrations of the Department of Economic Affairs. I feel that it is time that the poor Ministry of Labour were let off some of these tasks. I therefore ask him these questions with some sympathy towards him and anger not against him but against those who are responsible for this policy. My hon. Friend very rightly posed some of these questions. I want to know whether my hon. Friend's questions, which touched on points of law, should not receive the attention of a Law Officer of the Crown. We have no Law Officer here. These questions are important, and they are by no means easy to answer. I am far from wishing to belittle the abilities of the Parliamentary Secretary, who has shown considerable ability, but I do not see why he should allow himself to be dragged into this legal morass. It would be a death wish to invite, the Solicitor-General here, and I would not go that far, but I think that the presence of the Attorney-General might be helpful in order that we might be told how far we have got into this mess and how deeply.

I understand that one of the firms named in the Schedule to the Order has been engaged in the simple process of sacking its Birmingham workers and then re-engaging them on terms which raises them to the earnings of the Coventry workers. I ask the Parliamentary Secretary a direct question: how does that firm, in doing that, fit into its duty under the Order? The Parliamentary Secretary must answer that question.

A second question which has been asked by my hon. Friends is, was there or was there not a productivity agreement? If there were such an agreement, then all this intervention has been a waste of time. I am driven to the conclusion that in the Government's view, contrary to that held by hon. Members opposite, there was no productive agreement. In that case, what are the Government doing to protect their own policy from those who are attacking it and who are coercing firms who attempt to follow it?

These are straightforward questions, but the answers, as a result of the situation into which the Government have got themselves, are complicated and difficult —and I doubt whether they are applicable. I am profoundly sorry for the hon. Member that he should have to defend the detailed meanderings and elusive consequences of a policy initiated by others dedicated to the pactice of adumbrating on high but never walking the ground of ordinary men.

10.50 p.m.

Mr. John Ellis (Bristol, North-West)

I shall speak very briefly tonight. I must congratulate the hon. Member for Yeovil (Mr. Peyton) for remaining within order throughout the whole of his speech. He has been the only contributor to do so, and I shall speak briefly, if only because I do not understand the policy behind this Order. I hope for your guidance, Mr. Speaker, and no doubt I shall receive it later on. When one does not understand the policy behind the Order, it is difficult to understand the Order and get anything right.

This industry, and I am a member of the T.G.W.U., has a shocking labour relations record in this area. So much so that the Government asked Mr. Jack Scamp to act as a trouble-shooter and mediator, to look into the problem of the industry. He turned his attention to this particular section because, as with many other matters in the motor industry, it had a record of disturbance.

In concert with my union and the firms concerned, he was able to arrive at an agreement acceptable to all. It is rather strange, having reached this agreement, that the whole thing should be overturned as a result of Government action. The other thing that I find difficult to understand is that any economic policy must give increased productivity, so that there shall be more wealth available to the workers. This is an industry where we can demonstrate, without a shadow of doubt, that there would have been increased productivity.

The basis of the agreement was that the men would make return trips with loads. This is a salient point, and was part of the policy which I would have thought the Government would have been happy to see. We now have a situation which is ridiculous. Without using strong language, it typifies some of the effects of the policy that the Government are pursuing.

We now have the position in which the men will not be paid, and so they will not return with the loads. They will lose the benefit of the agreement, as will the firm. So the firm, the men and the country lose. This demonstrates that the policy resulting in this Order is seen in many ways to be lacking something. I understand from my union that the situation, to which the union refers as a bit ridiculous—I think it is a lot ridiculous—is that at least six more firms in the Midlands have not had an Order made against them and are continuing to operate extra payments and at the same time taking work from the other companies. I would like confirmation of this. Is it true? How do we justify this? The companies concerned are bound to carry out this Order, and the men, logically and rightly, have said that this was an agreement, and if they cannot have the payment they will not operate it. The situation will arise in which one firm is more economical than the other. I do not know whether my hon. Friend knows about these other firms. One firm will wax fat at the expense of the others.

This has not been a very happy occasion for me. I did not come here to speak against the Government in this way, and I thank right hon. and hon. Gentlemen opposite for not chyaking me. I hope that my hon. Friend will go back and tell his masters about the kind of debates that we have here late at night. I believe that we will then be in a much happier position to face the real opposition, which is on the benches opposite—and I say this without offence—rather than on these benches.

10.56 p.m.

The Joint Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Labour (Mr. Roy Hattersley)

Out of courtesy I must begin by thanking those felicitous right hon. and hon. Gentlemen on both sides of the House who have expressed their concern and sympathy for my task this evening. An invariable feature of these debates—and I have now replied to nine of them—is that during the debate I am offered a lot of sympathy, and an equally invariable feature is that it seems to be dissipated the moment I rise to reply.

Another invariable feature is that the hon. Member for Worthing (Mr. Higgins), who moved the Prayer on behalf of the Opposition, begins with a lucid and totally accurate statement of the position, but on this occasion he was less than accurate, and made some factual mistakes. Knowing his record, and the other speeches which he has made, I am sure the House will regard that as, above all, an indication of the complications and complexities of this Order.

Because of that, it is necessary for me to go in some detail through the facts as they are understood by the Government and to correct some of the mistakes which the hon. Gentleman made. But before I do that I must deal with the point which the hon. Gentleman and others made about proposed action against the parties to this agreement, or any other agreement made in defiance of an Order under the Act.

I hope the House understands that when hon. Members ask what the Government's attitude is, and whether it is the Government's intention to prosecute, whether it is the Government's intention to pursue the men through the courts, it is totally impossible for the Government to take any attitude at all because the Act is quite specific on this matter. Talking about penalties and about action, Sections 22 and 16 of the Act make it quite clear that the decision to prosecute is taken by the Attorney-General in his judicial capacity. It is not a matter for the Government, but for him as a Law Officer. I have dealt with that at the beginning because I want the House to understand that that is all I can or should say about the possibility of prosecution, and anything that I go on to say about this Order must be understood in the light of that paramount important legal fact.

I think that we can best understand the Order if we begin our consideration from the time when the agreement was signed in May, 1966. This agreement offered the men three sorts of increase: an increase of 3d. an hour on the basic rate, a reduction of the working week from 42½ to 41 hours, and overtime rates which were improved from time-and-a-third to time-and-a-half. It was to be operative from 1st January 1967.

A third of that agreement came into force immediately, the reduction of working hours, which was covered by a decision of a wages council. This meant that before the prices and incomes policy was announced in the House in its present form on 20th July, 1966, the working hours had been reduced to 41 as a result of the decision of the wages council. So there were, at that time, only two items outstanding, the 3d. an hour on the basic rates, and an increase in the overtime rate from time-and-a-third to time-and-a-half. The decision was that it should be implemented on 1st January, 1967.

Clearly, by the standards of the Government's prices and incomes policy, that was an existing commitment which, according to the two White Papers, should have its implementation deferred for six months. Plainly, the Government were right, when asked for advice by the employers, to say that, according to Government policy, that increase must be postponed until six months after the operative date.

Therefore, we are left with the two questions which have been posed time and time again this evening: whether the Order should be described as unnecessary or might be described as improper because, even within the standards of the Government's prices and incomes policy, and particularly paragraph 27 of the severe restraint White Paper, a productivity agreement existed which might justify the increase.

Before dealing with that, however, let us make certain—and this was the most important error made by the hon. Member for Worthing—that certainly no increase was justified, that certainly no increase was entitled under the other criterion which sometimes allows a breach in the standstill in the period of severe restraint.

By no standards are these men lowest-paid workers. The hon. Member for Worthing quoted figures which were quite wrong. He gave not the men's earnings, but their fall-back rates. A transporter driver, a man carrying a number of vehicles on a transporter, is guaranteed a weekly wage of £l6 10s. but his actual earnings rate is more than twice that amount. A man who ferries individual cars is guaranteed a weekly wage of £12 11s. 6d. but earns rather more than 50 per cent. above that minimum figure. Therefore, by any standards, these are comparatively well-paid men. They are certainly not men who would be allowed to breach the incomes policy because of the lowest-paid worker criterion.

The House will remember from Monday that the Government have continued to extend the payments which are made as a result of the lowest-paid criterion. If these men were in that category, the Government would be happy to allow the payment to go forward, but clearly they are not.

Mr. Norman Atkinson (Tottenham)

Can my hon. Friend give the number of hours involved in the average working week for the figures of earnings which he has given?

Mr. Hattersley

Certainly. The average working week approaches 60 hours on the maximum level. [Interruption.]

Mr. Orme

Then are they not lower-paid workers?

Mr. Hattersley

My hon. Friend must understand that no criterion that I, the Government or anybody else have laid down has ever suggested that a man who gets £16 10s., irrespective of the number of hours he works—for that is a fallback rate for transport drivers—is a lowest-paid worker. My hon. Friend the Member for Salford, West (Mr. Orme) and others are inclined to take a great deal of notice of what is said by the general secretary of the Transport and General Workers' Union. His view is that the lowest-paid worker is somebody earning fl5 a week or less. These transporter drivers are always earning £16 10s.

Mr. Charles Mapp (Oldham, East)

In view of the figure of hours given by my hon. Friend, am I not right in thinking that the Ministry is conniving at illegal hours for road vehicle drivers?

Mr. Hattersley

No, the Ministry is not. While the men may be technically at work for 60 hours, they are not driving for 60 hours. If they were, the position might be different. In that 60 hours they are available for work, waiting for loading and doing many other things as well. They are certainly not driving for the whole of that time.

Mr. Biffen

The hon. Gentleman has said that not by any standards could these men be considered as lowest-paid workers. That may or may not be true. Can he, however, tell the House by what, if any, standards we judge whether people are lower-paid workers? If there are any standards by which we are expected to judge lower-paid workers, will the hon. Gentleman circulate them in the OFFICIAL REPORT?

Mr. Hattersley

Three Orders ago—it seems much longer—I rehearsed for the House the many criteria which have been suggested as appropriate for judging who are lowest-paid workers. There is the Cousins criterion of £15, the Lord Cooper criterion of £14, the criteria that appeared in The Times, which turned out to be £10, the criterion laid down by the Prices and Incomes Board for agricultural workers and others, and so on. By not one of those do these men qualify. Were I to circulate each of those individuals and bodies there would, I assure the House, be no question of these men qualifying by the standards which those individuals and bodies have laid down.

The House knows only too well that the real argument tonight is not about whether these men qualify for an increase because they are among the lowest-paid workers, but whether they should qualify despite the incomes policy because of a productivity agreement. We must, therefore, examine this question in some detail.

I emphasise, as I did in my opening remarks, that understanding and describing the conditions that exist in this industry is a most difficult task. This industry has had notoriously bitter industrial relations in the last two years. As a result of that, it has a history of unrest, suspicion and mistrust. Because of that, and because of the strangely fierce competition that exists between one firm and another, it is an industry in which it is particularly difficult to obtain accurate and consistent facts.

When I discussed, with my right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster and the parties to this agreement, the simple facts of the matter, as we then tried to understand them, it was almost impossible to get management and men even to agree on the facts of the case. There were constant disputes and misunderstandings.

Mr. Mendelson

Would not it have been better, in view of the difficulties, for the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster and my hon. Friend to have invited the representatives of the unions concerned to meet the two Ministers before, rather than after, the announcement was made in the Gazette?

Mr. Hattersley

The unions concerned met and talked to officers of my Ministry long before the initial announcement was made in the Gazette. They had a series of meetings and were invited to put their case. Up to the time of the announcement in the Gazette, no case had been made under the prices and incomes criteria. They merely said that they believed that the agreement should go on because it had been freely negotiated. They took the line of the hon. Member for Oswestry (Mr. Biffen)—not trying to justify it in our terms but in his. Certainly they had many opportunities to explain to us the sort of productivity points which some hon. Members have tried to explain to the House tonight, but that opportunity was never taken.

Hon. Members will also understand that a complication arises if one is trying to decide if there has been a change in practices when the negotiating machinery of the industry undergoes a total and fundamental change in the way in which the negotiating machinery in this industry changed on 25th October, 1966. Until that time the men in the Birmingham group, the Longbridge group of companies, negotiated as a corporate entity with the union. Agreement was arrived at. It was binding on the union and on the Longbridge group as a whole.

But on 25th October, for reasons which need not concern us tonight, the Transport and General Workers' Union refused to continue any negotiations with the Longbridge group of companies as a group and began, on that day and thereafter, to make a series of individual agreements with individual companies, none of which are documented and all of which make changes in working practices difficult to compare with the agreements of May and April of 1963 and 1966. Although one agreement, that with the Longbridge group, appears on paper and can be checked, all the other agreements with individual companies are dependent on individual memory and word of mouth. All these things make the job of deciding whether or not there is a genuine productivity agreement fantastically difficult. The remarks of hon. Gentlemen opposite, and of some of my hon. Friends. demonstrate cleary the difficulties of the Government in taking a positive role and taking positive steps in industrial relations.

Mr. Reginald Eyre (Birmingham, Hall Green)

Would not the hon. Gentleman agree that it is damaging to the Ministry of Labour—whose chief function is to bring about industrial reconciliation—to be involved in Orders of this kind? If they are made by the Department of Economic Affairs, should not the Minister responsible for that Department be here to try to defend what is an indefensible position?

Mr. Hattersley

I am grateful that hon. Gentlemen opposite wish to extend their charity to my speech in reply to the debate. The relationship of my right hon. Friend to this Order is, in many ways, enviable. After all, he is the Minister designated in the Order and the one entitled to vary it or allow some payments to go forward, as I pointed out last Monday. My rôle in explaining and defending the Order this evening is a role that I am happy to occupy.

Let us turn to the productivity element in the agreement as it has been described this; evening. There are, in fact, potentially two productivity elements. The first concerns men who are described as "platers", the men who drive individual cars and who claim that the productivity element which is now being injected into the agreement which their union has with individual firms is the abandonment of using single rail tickets and the practice of using season tickets. The second supposed productivity element relates to those involved in using transporters. not for single journeys, loaded, from Birmingham to wherever Birmingham-produced cars are to go, but bringing back cars as well—reloading and returning full rather than empty.

I must make it clear that it is the contention of many employers that if, in fact, there was at some point an agreement to bring back transporters loaded from their original destination, a payment was made for that in the agreement of April. 1963. I re-emphasise that I can say no more than that is the contention of the industry.

The hon. Gentleman will understand the difficulties of evaluating that contention when I say that because of the particularly fluid nature of many of the firms in the industry, because of the way they overlap and are suddenly created and suddenly go into liquidation, many of the firms cannot give an accurate answer even as to the date when they began to use transporters. What is certainly the case is that some firms insist that they were using transporters before April, 1963, and that the unions were given a payment for it at that time.

Mr. Mendelson

Why is my hon. Friend basing the decision behind this Order entirely on the views of some of the companies, when the trade union involved has a completely different view of the matter? Why accept this one-sided point of view?

Mr. Hattersley

Not for the first time my hon. Friend is over-eager. I go on to describe the contentions of the union which were given to my right hon. Friend and to me at the same time. The contentions of the union are that whatever the plusage payments, which are described in the agreement of 1963, were for, they were not for reloading and carrying vehicles back to Birmingham and the Midlands. The union insists that this was an element introduced into the agreement after May, 1966. They insist that some firms could not possibly have signed an agreement in 1963 making plusage payments for reloading because they did not at that time own transporters which made reloading and double carrying a feasible proposition.

Those are the two contentions on which the Government are required, first of all, to make a decision, whether they are right or wrong. On the evidence presented to me, I believe that certainly for some firms reloading is a new practice. I believe that for some firms reloading is not a new practice. But I believe that whether it is a new practice or not is not strictly relevant to the issue that we are discussing. Even if reloading was a new practice injected into the agreement on or after May, 1966, by the criterion of productivity agreements as we understand it, and as the National Board for Prices and Incomes has laid down the criterion, the reloading agreement has not been presented to us as a genuine productivity bargain. It may be—and I almost make this appeal to the unions—that there is still time and that the unions will still take the opportunity of making that submission and describing that case; but it has not yet been done.

Before turning to that, let us at least dispose of the issue of season tickets—

Mr. Higgins

Before the hon. Gentleman leaves that point, may I say this. He will realise that if the Government take the view that it is not a productivity agreement, the arrangements which the unions are introducing must constitute persuasion, or influence, or compulsion within the terms of the Section that I quoted. We appreciate the point that he has made about the Law Officers considering the matter, but there ought to be some time limit on them. Has he discussed that with his hon. Friends and when will they give a ruling?

Mr. Hattersley

I know that the hon. Gentleman was listening carefully to me, so he will remember that I did not say that in the Government's opinion it was not a productivity agreement, but that the evidence to convince us that it was had not yet been presented to us—[Interruption.] I went further, and said that we were still open to conviction on the matter. I went further still, and described something as almost an appeal to the union to make its position known, and to describe why they called this a genuine productivity agreement.

What I want to make quite clear is that whether or not the transporter agreement is one, by our standards the arrangement does not conform, on the evidence presented to us now, to a genuine productivity bargain. Let us all agree before we deal with anything else that by no means can the present arrangement with season tickets be described as a productivity agreement. No matter what the arrangement is about travelling, and whether the men travel on individual tickets or on season tickets, it has nothing to do with productivity. It requires no more effort nor does it give more production. The only productivity element on which we are open to conviction is in regard to the transporter side.

Before the Government are persuaded, one party or the other must convince us, on very precise criteria, very rigid rules—the seven conditions that have been laid down by the Prices and Incomes Board as a real test—that a genuine productivity agreement has been brought about. One of the conditions is that the community as well, and not just the two parties—not just the union and the employers—should benefit. The country, too, must benefit.

My hon. Friend the Member for Penistone (Mr. Mendelson) accused my right hon. Friend the First Secretary of somehow denying—I think the words were—"benefit to the nation". I hope he will tell us, and I will gladly give way to him while he does so, what the benefit to the nation was. As I understand it, the agreement that men should return with a loaded rather than with an empty vehicle gave no benefit to the nation at all. The price of car transporting was not coming down. The price to the consumer was not being reduced—

Mr. Mendelson

I would remind my hon. Friend that my point was—and I did not even mention the First Secretary—that the union maintains that with a great many of the firms involved the return journey with six cars is a new element, and therefore represents a genuine productivity agreement. Why does my hon. Friend use certain technical positions now to justify the decision of his Department or of the First Secretary not accepting this point of view?

Mr. Hattersley

I must repeat what I have said. I have conceded to my hon. Friend that there may well be some individual firms for whom the return loading is a new arrangement, but I have not conceded that anyone has made out that the new arrangement is a productivity agreement. The question I have asked my hon. Friend remains unanswered: what is the benefit to the nation that he describes as coming out of this agreement? [HON. MEMBERS: "More efficiency."] More efficiency which up to now nobody has suggested would be reflected in the form of reduced prices—

Mr. Burden

It must be in the interests of productivity generally and benefit the nation as a whole if a vehicle that would otherwise return empty from where it came loaded takes, instead, a return load to that same spot. That must be productivity.

Mr. Hattersley

I am sure the hon. Member has read Report 23 of the Prices and Incomes Board. He will recall from the final chapter that the Board urges the Government to accept seven criteria of productivity. I repeat that that is the position on which the Government stand. If the hon. Member can persuade either party to produce evidence, which they have not yet tried to do, that this agreement conforms with those standards, the Government will think again.

I turn to two consistent points made when these Orders are prayed against. The first is that the Government are being arbitrary, capricious or even sinister in their choice of adversaries and that the Orders are not comprehensive, that somehow someone slips through the net. I repeat that the Government make Orders against unions or groups of men or firms which choose to break the prices and incomes policy. When someone asks, "Who are the Government picking on, why are they picking on the weak?"—as we used to be told—or "the militant"—as we are told this evening, I reply that the Government are picking on people who choose to break the line on prices and incomes policy.

When the hon. Member for Oswestry asks, "What about the 80 cases a day; why are you not making Orders against them?" I reply that we are not making Orders against them because the result of the inquiries to my Ministry is that they choose voluntarily to abide by the rules of the prices and incomes policy. Of course this is preferable and no Order is made necessary in nine cases out of ten, but in the one case it is made necessary because we must cover all appropriate categories in the industry.

I turn to the accusation that some firms which ought to have been included in the Order have not been included. We continue to hear allegations about malpractices and that some people are defying the policy and getting away with it. The hon. Member for Oswestry mentioned the case of Morgan Crucible, which is almost as hoary a chestnut as Acrow, which is conforming to the policy. He went on to say that somehow the fact that the word "remuneration" appears in the Order suggests that the Government are allowing some through. One can always imagine what point the hon. Member will make on a Wednesday evening because he asks a Question on the subject on a Monday afternoon. In the part of the world I come from we call this "telegraphing your passes". He having warned me by a Question on Monday, let me assure him that the Orders cover remuneration in all forms. If he has evidence of forms which have not actually put up wages but which have sought to give more remuneration by back door methods by increasing payments or allowances, it is his duty to tell my Ministry in order that the line of the prices and incomes policy may be held.

Let me look at the accusation that individual and specific firms in Birmingham should be within this Order but are not and that one firm by re-employing under the Coventry agreement got round the provisions of the Act. There is no truth in that. The hon. Member for Worcestershire, South (Sir G. Nabarro) said in a previous debate that any owner of a transport fleet could discharge his men and re-employ them on another agreement and by that means flout Govment policy. I assure the House that could not possibly be the case. The nature of a Section 29 Order is so comprehensive that that in itself would be defying and avoiding the intention of the Act and would be a breach just as much as paying an increase.

If the men were subject to the Long-bridge agreement and paid an increase it would be a breach which a Section 29 Order would not countenance. The Coventry agreement is no more remunerative to the men than the Longbridge agreement. I have seen a theoretical model in which an imaginary man travels a hypothetical 100 miles and because he works in Coventry he gets more than if he works in Birmingham. But this industry is not made up of theoretical men or hypothetical journeys. Our information is that, over any one year, good times with bad—this is the view of the union and of the employers—the Coventry agreement pays no more than the Birmingham agreement. Changing from one to the other, although it may have caused gladness in the hearts of hon. Members opposite, in no way defies the Order or breaches the intention.

Next, we are told that there are firms excluded from the Order which should not be, that there may be firms paying more but whose names do not appear in the Schedule. We have had three accusations or suggestions. The first we have investigated, and we have discovered that the firm is not paying an enhanced rate. The second firm says that it is not paying an enhanced rate, and it is to provide evidence to support that contention during the latter part of this week. The third is a wholly owned subsidiary or, at least, a wholly associated firm of one of those which appear in the list. It was the belief of the management that, by notifying us of its principal interest, it had somehow covered as much as it was required to do, the interest of its smaller firms as well as of the larger.

It has always been the Government's intention and policy to limit Orders as precisely as possible to those firms which were breaking the rules rather than apply them more widely or haphazardly, including and antagonising men and firms which were really applying the policy voluntarily.

The Government's prices and incomes policy is essentially a voluntary policy. It is essentially a policy which has worked because most workers in this country have chosen to apply it voluntarily. The reason why wage movements have been of an unparalleled small size over the last nine months is that the policy has been accepted voluntarily.

I repeat, as I have done on nine occasions now and, no doubt, will do on many more during the next six months, that the importance of making Orders against those minorities who choose to

flout the policy is to demonstrate to the vast majority who accept it voluntarily that there is justice not only for the militant, not only for those who are determined to go to the head of the queue irrespective of their merits, but for the militant and the voluntarily accepting alike.

11.27 p.m.

Mr. Harold Gurden (Birmingham, Selly Oak)

There is no time now to make the speech that I wanted to make, but I must emphasise that the charge which is made against the Government and the Minister, which has not been denied, is that their action has caused chaos in the industry. The industry is still in chaos, and the hon. Gentleman has not told us what reply he has given to the letter which the employers wrote on 5th April asking "Where do we go from here? What are we to do?". All the Government have done is to cause chaos and reduce productivity, and now we are left in the air, as the industry itself is left in the air.

The companies do not know how to get the job done. Mr. Alan Law, the representative of the Transport and General Workers' Union in Birmingham, is delighted that, once again, he has an opportunity to put the industry into difficulty. His object, successfully achieved on several occasions, has been to stop the motor industry, and this is what he is prepared to do again. The Minister ought to tell the industry now what the next step is.

Question put:—

The House divided: Ayes 142, Noes 195.

Division No. 310.]	AYES	[11.30 p.m.
Allason, James (Hemel Hempstead)	Bruce-Gardyne, J.	Eden, Sir John
Astor, John	Buchanan-Smith, Alick (Angus, N & M)	Elliot, Capt. Walter (Carshalton)
Atkins, Humphrey (M't'n & M'd'n)	Buck, Antony (Colchester)	Errington, Sir Eric
Baker, W. H. K.	Burden, F. A.	Fisher, Nigel
Batsford, Brian	Carr, Rt. Hn. Robert	Fletcher-Cooke, Charles
Bennett, Sir Frederic (Torquay)	Chichester-Clark, R.	Foster, Sir John
Berry, Hn. Anthony	Clegg, Walter	Galbraith, Hn. T. G.
Bessell, Peter	Corfield, F. V.	Gibson-Watt, David
Biffen, John	Costain, A. P.	Gilmour, Sir John (Fife, E.)
Birch, Rt. Hn. Nigel	Crawley, Aidan	Glover, Sir Douglas
Black, Sir Cyril	Crouch, David	Gower, Raymond
Blaker, Peter	Currie, G. B. H.	Grant, Anthony
Bossom, Sir Clive	Dalkeith, Earl of	Grieve, Percy
Boyd-Carpenter, Rt. Hn. John	Davidson, James (Aberdeenshire, W.)	Grimond, Rt. Hn. J.
Braine, Bernard	Dean, Paul (Somerset, N.)	Gurden, Harold
Brewis, John	Deedes, Rt. Hn. W. F. (Ashford)	Hall, John (Wycombe)
Brinton, Sir Tatton	Digby, Simon Wingfield	Hall-Davis, A. G. F.
Bromley-Davenport, Lt. -Col. Sir Walter	Dodds-Parker, Douglas	Harris, Reader (Heston)
Brown, Sir Edward (Bath)	Drayson, G. B.	Harrison, col. Sir Harwood (Eye)
Harvey, Sir Arthur Vere	Maclean, Sir Fitzroy	Sharples, Richard
Harvie Anderson, Miss	McMaster, Stanley	Shaw, Michael (Sc'b'gh & Whitby)
Heseltine, Michael	Maude, Angus	Sinclair, Sir George
Higgins, Terence L.	Mawby, Ray	Smith, John
Hiley, Joseph	Maxwell-Hyslop, R. J.	Steel, David (Roxburgh)
Hill, J. E. B.	Mills, Stratton (Belfast, N.)	Stoddart-Scott, Col. Sir M. (Ripon)
Hirst, Geofrey	Miscampbell, Norman	Taylor, Sir Charles (Eastbourne)
Hobson, Rt. Hn. Sir John	Mitchell, David (Basingstoke)	Taylor, Frank (Moss Side)
Hogg, Rt. Hn. Quintin	More, Jasper	Temple, John M.
Holland, Philip	Munro-Lucas-Tooth, Sir Hugh	Thatcher, Mrs. Margaret
	Nicholls, Sir Harmar	Thorpe, Rt. Hn. Jeremy
Hornby, Richard	Noble, Rt. Hn. Michael	Tilney, John
Hunt, John	Nott, John	Turton, Rt. Hn. R. H.
Hutchison, Michael Clark	Osborn, John (Hallam)	van Straubenzee, W. R.
Irvine, Bryant Godman (Rye)	Page, Graham (Crosby)	Vaughan-Morgan, Rt. Hn. Sir John
Jenkin, Patrick (Woodford)	Pardoe, John	Wainwright, Richard (Colne Valley)
Johnson Smith, G. (E. Grinstead)	Pearson, Sir Frank (Clitheroe)	Walters, Dennis
Johnston, Russell (Inverness)	Peel, John	Weatherill, Bernard
Jopling, Michael	Peyton, John	Webster, David
Joseph, Rt. Hn. Sir Keith	Pink, R. Bonner	Whitelaw, Rt. Hn. William
Kaberry, Sir Donald	Pounder, Rafton	Wilson, Geoffrey (Truro)
Kershaw, Anthony	Pym, Francis	Winstanley, Dr. M. P.
King, Evelyn (Dorset, S.)	Ramsden, Rt. Hn, James	Wolrige-Gordon, Patrick
Kirk, Peter	Renton, Rt. Hn. Sir David	Wood, Rt. Hn. Richard
Knight, Mrs. Jill	Ridley, Hn. Nicholas	Wylie, N. R.
Langford-Holt, Sir John	Ridsdale, Julian	Younger, Hn. George
Legge-Bourke, Sir Harry	Rossi, Hugh (Hornsey)
Lloyld, Ian (P'tsm'th, Langstone)	Royle, Anthony	TELLERS FOR THE AYES:
Lubbock, Eric	Russell, Sir Ronald	Mr Reginald Eyre and
MacArthur, Ian	Scott, Nicholas	Mr Hector Monro.
NOES
Abse, Leo	Edwards, Rt. Hn. Ness (Caerphilly)	Lestor, Miss Joan
Anderson, Donald	Edwards, William (Merioneth)	Lewis, Ron (Carlisle)
Archer, Peter	English, Michael	Lomas, Kenneth
Armstrong, Ernest	Ennals, David	Loughlin, Charles
Ashley, Jack	Ensor, David	Lyons, Edward (Bradford, E.)
Bacon, Rt. Hn. Alice	Evans, Albert (Islington, S.W.)	MacColl, James
Bagier, Gordon A. T.	Evans, Ioan L. (Birm'h'm, Yardley)	MacDermot, Niall
Barnes, Michael	Faulds, Andrew	McGuire, Michael
Baxter, William	Fernyhough, E.	Mackintosh, John P.
Beaney, Alan	Finch, Harold	Maclennan, Robert
Bence, Cyril	Foley, Maurice	McMillan, Tom (Glasgow, C.)
Bennett, James (G'gow, Bridgeton)	Ford, Ben	MacPherson, Malcolm
Binns, John	Forrester, John	Mahon, Peter (Preston, s.)
Bishop, E. S.	Fowler, Gerry	Mallalieu, E. L. (Brigg)
Blackburn, F.	Freeson, Reginald	Manuel, Archie
Blenkinsop, Arthur	Galpern, Sir Myer	Mapp, Charles
Boardman, H.	Garrett, W. E.	Marquand, David
Bottomley, Rt. Hn. Arthur	Ginsburg, David	Maxwell, Robert
Boyden, James	Gourlay, Harry	Mayhew, Christopher
Braddock, Mrs. E. M,	Gray, Dr. Hugh (Yarmouth)	Mellish, Robert
Bradley, Tom	Greenwood, Rt. Hn. Anthony	Millan, Bruce
Bray, Dr. Jeremy	Gregory, Arnold	Milne, Edward (Blyth)
Brooks, Edwin	Grey, Charles (Durham)	Mitchell, R. C. (S'th'pton, Test)
Brown, Hugh D. (G'gow, Provan)	Griffiths, David (Rother Valley)	Morgan, Elystan (Cardiganshire)
Brown, R. W. (Shoreditch & F'bury)	Griffiths, Rt. Hn. James (Llanelly)	Morris, Charles R. (Openshaw)
Buchan, Norman	Hamilton, James (Bothwell)	Moyle, Roland
Buchanan, Richard (G'gow, Sp'burn)	Harper, Joseph	Murray, Albert
Cant, R. B.	Harrison, Walter (Wakefield)	Neal, Harold
Coe, Denis	Haseldine, Norman	Noel-Baker, Francis (Swindon)
Coleman, Donald	Hattersley, Roy	Noel-Baker Rt. Hn. Philip (Derby, S.)
Concannon, J. D.	Hazell, Bert	Norwood, Christopher
Conlan, Bernard	Hooley, Frank	O'Malley, Brian
Cronin, John	Houghton, Rt. Hn. Douglas	Oram, Albert E.
Crossman, Rt. Hn. Richard	Howarth, Robert (Bolton, E.)	Oswald, Thomas
Cullen, Mrs. Alice	Howell, Denis (Small Heath)	Owen, Dr. David (Plymouth, S'tn)
Dalyell, Tam	Howie, W.	Padley, Walter
		Page, Derek (King's Lynn)
Davidson, Arthur (Accrington)	Hoy, James	Palmer, Arthur
Davies, Dr. Ernest (Stretford)	Hughes, Rt. Hn. Cledwyn (Anglesey)	Pannell, Rt. Hn. Charles
Davies, G. Elfed (Rhondda, E.)	Hughes, Roy (Newport)	Parkyn, Brian (Bedford)
Davies, Ednyfed Hudson (Conway)	Hynd, John	Pearson, Arthur (Pontypridd)
Davies, Ifor (Gower)	Irvine, A. J. (Edge Hill)	Pentland, Norman
Davies, Robert (Cambridge)	Janner, Sir Barnett	Prentice, Rt. Hn. R. E.
Delargy, Hugh	Jenkins, Rt. Hn. Roy (Stechford)	Price, Christopher (Perry Barr)
Dempsey, James	Johnson, James (K'ston-on-Hull, W.)	Price, William (Rugby)
Dewar, Donald	Jones, Dan (Burnley)	Probert, Arthur
Diamond, Rt. Hn. John	Jones, Rt. Hn. Sir Elwyn (W. Ham, S.)	Rees, Merlyn
Dobson, Ray	Jones, J. Idwal (Wrexham)	Rhodes, Geoffrey
Doig, Peter	Jones, T. Alec (Rhondda West)	Richard, Ivor
Dunnett, Jack	Judd, Frank	Roberts, Goronwy (Caernarvon)
Dunwoody, Mrs. Gwyneth (Exeter)	Kelley, Richard	Rogers, George (Kensington, N.)
Dunwoody, Dr. John (F'th & C'b'e)	Kenyon, Clifford	Rose, Paul
Eadie, Alex	Lawson, George	Ross, Rt. Hn. William

Rowland, Christopher (Meriden)	Thornton, Ernest	Williams, Alan Lee (Hornchurch)
Rowlands, E. (Cardiff, N.)	Tinn, James	Williams, Clifford (Abertillery)
Sheldon, Robert	Urwin, T. W.	Williams, Mrs. Shirley (Hitchin)
Shore, Peter (Stepney)	Varley, Eric G.	Williams, W. T. (Warrington)
Short, Rt. Hn. Edward (N'c'tle-u-Tyne)	Walker, Harold (Doncaster)	Willis, George (Edinburgh, E.)
Silkin, Rt. Hn. John (Deptford)	Wallace, George	Wilson, William (Coventry, S.)
Silkin, Hn. S. C. (Dulwich)	Watkins, David (Consett)	Winterbottom, R. E.
Skeffington, Arthur	Watkins, Tudor (Brecon & Radnor)	Woodburn, Rt. Hn. A.
Small, William	Wellbeloved, James	Woof, Robert
Snow, Julian	Wells, William (Walsall, N.)	Yates, Victor
Spriggs, Leslie	White, Mrs. Eirene
Stonehouse, John	Whitlock, William	TELLERS FOR THE NOES:
Swingler, Stephen	Wilkins, W. A.	Mr Alan Fitch and
Taverne, Dick	Willey, Rt. Hn. Frederick	Mr Neil McBride.