§ Mr. Arthur Lewisasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer whether the criteria adopted by his Department of only permitting dividend increases above the norm when a binding commitment had been made prior to the 1968 Budget applied to all such dividend increases; and whether he will give a list of companies which were permitted to increase their dividends and those who were refused permission to do so.
§ Mr. DiamondDividend increases have only been approved when companies satisfied the requirements of the present dividend restraint scheme. Accordingly, all those companies which had entered into binding dividend commitments before 19th March, 1968, have been allowed to meet them.