3.
7.
In effect this means that our
labour legislation should be at least comparable to
I do not believe
that of our principal competitors.
Honourable Members would think it right that we
should aim at less. Nor could we defend a lower
target either to our own workers or to the
Governments of developed countries with whose
products ours compete. I should warn you that I
see serious risk in not achieving such comparability
and achieving it fast. Indeed it may come as a
shock to Honourable Members that some aspects of
our legislation are not already equal to that of
our Asian competitors. However fortunately this is
a field in which we have made rapid progress in the last 6 or 7 years, and I would expect this
Government to achieve its target within 5 years at
the most and perhaps less. I am satisfied that we
can do so by steps graduated so as not to affect
materially our competitive position;
but in any
case in the mood current in our main markets the
danger to our commercial prospects of failure to
make rapid progress in this field is greater than
the comparatively small implications there may be
for our competitive position.