§ 3.23 p.m.
§ LORD BROCKWAYMy Lords, I beg leave to ask the second Question which stands in my name on the Order Paper.
§ The Question was as follows:
§ To ask Her Majesty's Government whether they will discourage the managements of public services and companies in the private sector of this country from paying their employees less than a living wage.
§ THE MINISTER WITHOUT PORTFOLIO (LORD DRUMALBYN)My Lords, from the time of the Chequers talks last year the Government have repeatedly stressed the importance they attach to improving the relative position of the lower paid. In the Consultative Document on The Price and Pay Code they have made it clear that they expect negotiators to have full regard to the objectives of improving the position of the low paid within the Stage 2 pay limit.
§ LORD BROCKWAYMy Lords, while thanking the Minister, may I ask him whether or not he thinks this is rather an inadequate way to deal with the problem? Would not the best example to businesses in South Africa be to put our own house in order in this matter? Did not the noble Lord's own Department issue a Statement last December showing that 5.7 per cent. of adult men do not get more than £20 a week and that 58 per cent. of adult women workers—an appalling figure—do not get such a living wage? Would Her Majesty's Government consult with the Trades Union Congress to establish a minimum living wage for all workers in this country?
§ LORD DRUMALBYNMy Lords, Her Majesty's Government are extremely anxious to improve the position of the lower paid. Experience abroad, howe-ever, shows that fixing a minimum wage is not necessarily the best way to tackle this problem, particularly because it is the needs of families and not just the needs of an individual which are important. But the Government have in 866 the last two and a half years been presiding over, if that is the right expression, a considerable improvement in wages. If I may quote the example of the National Health Service ancillaries, there has been an increase between October, 1970, and October 1972, of 33.1 per cent. for men and of 42.6 per cent. for women in full-time employment, against a Retail Price Index increase of 18 per cent.
§ BARONESS SUMMERSKILLMy Lords, is the noble Lord not aware that despite this increase these women are the lowest paid in the country? Many people would regard what they receive as below subsistence level. What we want to know, in view of the revelations of the ancillary workers in the hospital service and their miserable rate of pay, is what the Government are going to do to prevent the same exploitation in other public services and in private industry.
§ LORD DRUMALBYNMy Lords, dealing with the first part of what the noble Baroness has said, there was a reduction in the differential between men's and women's wages in the ancillary services last October. There can be another one under Stage 2, of a third of the remaining difference between men's and women's wages. I can assure the noble Baroness that the Government are very sincere about this, and I think their record so far shows that they are taking the mater seriously and dealing not only with the wages front but also with the family incomes front.
§ LORD SHINWELLMy Lords, is the Minister aware that few of us would deny that the Government are undoubtedly anxious to improve the conditions of those at the lower end of the wage scale? We accept that. But would the Minister deny that in some sections of the retail trades, and also in some sections of the catering trade, the rates of pay are below what is regarded as subsistence level? May I further ask the noble Lord whether he is aware that in the negotiations between the unions and the Ford Company it has now been suggested (and possibly agreed by the company) that though they cannot go beyond the norm embodied in the Government's policy, at any rate they will provide fringe benefits? Is it possible to do something of that kind in other spheres?
§ LORD DRUMALBYNMy Lords, even within Stage 2 something of that kind is being done, and I can assure the noble Lord that the Government are most anxious to secure that the remuneration of the lowest paid is improved. The evidence is that this is being done, and we are anxious to negotiate with the Trades Union Congress to secure improvements, for example, by the setting up of a board to deal with the lower paid and by the arrangement of threshold agreements.
§ BARONESS SUMMERSKILLMy Lords, if that is so and the Government are thinking afresh on this question, why did they, only two days ago, offer the women in the ancillary service a one-eightieth increase and the men two-eightieths?
§ LORD DRUMALBYNMy Lords, that is a more complicated question. It was suggested that each should be offered one eighty-eighth and the result would have been the same for both; but in either case, of course, the noble Baroness will recognise that this reduction in the differential to which I have referred is outside the pay rise.
§ LORD GEORGE-BROWNMy Lords, may I ask the Minister this: do we not all recognise that, whatever should be done about wealth or about income, the Trades Union Congress should be asked to understand that if we are to move the hospital ancillary workers, the nurses, and anybody else one likes to mention, forward, then some fellows have to stand back? May I further ask the Minister: Is this not the same problem that I had at the beginning of 1965? The question is: Are the Transport and General Workers' Union or the A.E.U. willing to ask the dock workers, or the car workers in Coventry, to stay still while the underpaid essential workers go forward?
§ LORD DRUMALBYNMy Lords, Her Majesty's Government entirely agree with the noble Lord in this matter. I would only add, if I may, that the Trades Union Congress is still more ready to listen to the noble Lord than to listen to me, and I hope that they will do so.
THE EARL OF ARRANMy Lords, I am sorry, but this is something that I care about. Would Her Majesty's Government agree that regarding the Ford workers and fringe benefits it would be possible, without breaking the so-called Government rules, to consolidate the workers' bonuses which at present are subject to penalisation? Could some solution be found on that basis? I have been to Dagenham; and perhaps Her Majesty's Government will allow me to express this point of view.
§ LORD DRUMALBYNMy Lords, these are matters of course at the present time for negotiation within the framework of Stage 2. I do not think I can go further than that, except to say that the services of the Department of Employment are always available to help out in these matters.