§ 64. Mr. Langford-Holtasked the Secretary of State for Air whether he will seek an amendment to the agreement reached with the A.E.U. with regard to dilutees, since this agreement has resulted in men classed as skilled under the agreement having in authority over them charge hands with 10 years' aircraft engineering experience but who are classed as unskilled by the A.E.U. and the Air Ministry.
§ Mr. A. HendersonNo. The agreement to which the hon. and gallant Member refers was negotiated by my Department in 1939, at a time of acute shortage of fully skilled manpower in the aircraft engineering industry, and under its terms we were able to employ on skilled work a dilutee class of labour. Both the fully skilled workman and the dilutee receive the same standard rates of pay but in a number of cases fully skilled workmen receive a higher rate of merit pay than do the dilutees. Although, as the hon. Member indicates, many of these dilutees have now obtained ten years' aeronautical engineering experience, they still cannot, under the terms of the agreement, be classed as fully skilled. The dilutee who on other grounds is suitable for promotion to charge hand does, however, receive on promotion the standard rate of charge pay which would be payable to a fully skilled man in the same circumstances.