§ 22. Mr. Grantasked the Secretary of State for Employment and Productivity how many man-hours have been lost in Great Britain through official strikes, unofficial strikes and working to rule, respectively, for each year since 1964.
§ Mr. HattersleyIn the official statistics loss of time due to stoppages is measured in terms of "days lost". Information is not available about losses due to other forms of industrial action. We have separate figures for stoppages known to have been official. We do not know whether all the remainder were unofficial but the great majority would have fallen within this category. As the rest of the reply consists of a table of figures, I will, with permission, circulate a statement in the OFFICIAL REPORT.
§ Mr. GrantCan the hon. Gentleman confirm that, excluding coal mining, the number of stoppages has virtually doubled in the last five years? In view of the gravity of the situation and the state of the economy, why cannot we be given an absolute assurance that the First Secretary of State will introduce legislation on her White Paper this Session?
§ Mr. HattersleyI suspected that the supplementary question would concern the White Paper. I urge the hon. Gentleman to examine the circulated figures, and indeed those going back further than the period about which he asks, and then decide whether they lead him and his right hon. Friends to draw the conclusions about industrial relations which were distributed to the Press yesterday. I do not read that sort of inference into the figures.
§ Mr. OrmeFirst, could my hon. Friend say what proportion of the stoppages occurred in private industry as opposed to the public sector? Secondly, following the publication of the White Paper, how does he and the First Secretary of State hope to overcome the difficulty of improving industrial relations by taking legally enforceable action?
§ Mr. HattersleyI cannot answer the first part of the supplementray question without notice. The second part is clearly a different matter.
§ Mr. R. CarrWill the hon. Gentleman now answer my hon. Friend's question about the date of legislation? As the Government evidently regard this as an important matter, is it not urgent that we should have legislation quickly?
§ Mr. HattersleyThe right hon. Gentleman knows very well that that is both a different question and a question for the Leader of the House. My right hon. Friend regards her task as attacking the causes rather than the symptoms of our industrial troubles, and that means that she must attack them at the right time rather than the time which will gain the maximum publicity.
§ Mr. BarnettWhile there are no unofficial strikes in Germany, for example, that is not necessarily because of the industrial courts there, although they may have some deterrent value, but mainly because of the legal action at local level in setting up workers' councils and worker directors on supervisory boards. Will my hon. Friend consider that in the wider context of solving the problem of industrial unrest?
§ Mr. HattersleyI can only say that I am astounded by the number of conclusions to be drawn from a table of figures to be circulated in HANSARD tomorrow.
§ Following is the information available:
| THE NUMBERS OF DAYS LOST IN ALL STOPPAGES OF WORK DUE TO INDUSTRIAL DISPUTES IN GREAT BRITAIN AND THE NUMBERS OF DAYS LOST IN STOPPAGES KNOWN TO HAVE BEEN OFFICIAL WERE: | |||
| All Stoppages in progress | Stoppages known to have been official (included in Col. 2) | ||
| (1) | (2) | (3) | |
| 1964 | … | 2,243,000 | 690,000 |
| 1965 | … | 2,785,000 | 606,000 |
| 1966 | … | 2,287 000 | 1,108,000 |
| 1967 | … | 2,728,000 | 391,000 |
| 1968 | … | 4,607,000 | 1,759,000 |
| The figures for 1968 are provisional. |