CONFIDENTIAL
14 August, 1967.
115
You were of course aware that we had labour matters scheduled for discussion with the Governor on his recent arrival here and you no doubt saw the brief he brought with him prepared by Hetherington. Our discussions on labour matters were, in fact, confined to matters covered in that brief as set out under the following heads and I am now writing to let you know the outcome.
Hours of Work
2. We were very interested to learn of the counter-proposals under this head which you expect to be put forward by employers organisations (as detailed in paragraph 6 of the brief). Sir David thought it might be helpful to you, in the context of your further consultations with industry, if you knew our preliminary reactions to them. His inclination was to suggest that, if they were in general acceptable here, you might take the initiative in formulating detailed proposals along these lines and not wait for industry to make the running.
3. At first sight, the proposals seem to us to offer the possibility of a considerable advance, but whether this will, in fact, be the case will depend on three main criteria:-
(a) the agreed calendar;
(0) overtime arrangements during the transitional period;
(c) embodiment of the calendar in legislation.
4.
If you could achieve an agreed calendar of not more than four years covering the whole of the transitional period required for the introduction of a standard 48-hour week in all industries, you may take it that this would be acceptable to Ministers, so far as the time factor is concerned; although it would naturally be preferred if this period could be shortened. It would be important to ensure a significant reduction in the standard week in the first year - say 5 hours. All this is, of course, very much tied up with the second of the criteria mentioned above, the questio n of overtime. On this, the absolute maximum which would be acceptable to Ministers would be 300 hours per annum for the transitional period. Working within this limit, it might help to fit in with the phasing if the existing 26 week requirement on overtime were suspended during the transitional period and this, too, would be accepted by Ministers, provided that it was clearly understood that this requirement and the existing limits on overtime would be reintroduced at the end of that period.
5.
As regards the third criteris, it would very greatly help in meeting presentational difficulties here if the actual phased programme were embodied in legislation presumably in the relevant Regulations or Orders to be made as soon as the recently introduced
M.D.I. GASS, ESQ., C.M.G.
Bill
CONFIDENTIAL