10
that unions may occasionally reach understandings with employers which
cover a much larger number of workers than the union's own membership.
On the other hand, many of these negotiations are of an ad hoc
character, arising out of specific disputes, and there appears a general
reluctance on the part of private employers to actually sign agreements.
20.
-
One or two signed agreements between employers' associations and
trade unions which I had translated appeared to me of the most
elementary character, covering merely basic minimum wage-rates and over-
time payment, with very few associated conditions of a minor character.
It is true that fragmentation is, if not quite as characteristic of
Hong Kong employers' associations as it is of trade unions, very nearly
so: there are currently 44 bodies registered as such, and several of
them operate in the same trades (there are, for instance, three separate
organisations of plastic manufacturers their difference, I gather,
being mainly connected with varying regional origin of Chinese owner-
ships). Even where employers are grouped in a cohesive way, as in the
case of the Spinners' Association (though not necessarily as employers'
associations, even though labour policy may be one of their functions)
there is usually an evident hostility to making agreements as a group.
It is notable that the Hong Kong Employers' Federation regarded a recent
agreement, in which it had been instrumental, between all the stevedoring
concerns (except the Peking-owned ones) with both Left and Right unions
as quite exceptional.
21.
ww
A number of individual concerns, especially the major utilities, do
claim to have regular negotiations (usually annual) with union
representatives on the revision of wage-rates, etc, but so far as we
could discover these were generally of the most ritual or nominal
character. The typical process, as it was described to us on several
occasions, was one in which the management informed the union with which
it dealt (usually the Right-wing one few managements "recognise" Left-
wing unions) of its proposed alterations for the next year, listened to
objections if any were made, and then announced its decisions with
little if any amendment. The most elaborate of these processes, as it
was described to us by the firm, in effect involved a management
decision as to the forthcoming year's wage-revisions: it would then post
a notice proposing a lower offer in the works; the union would make some
counter-demands, whereupon the management announced an improvement on its
first offer which in fact implemented its initial, and private decision.
/22. It