Page 700 29th August (referred to in paragraph 1 above) extends to any proposals from this Council and, from the Furnishing and Allied Trades Wages Council, which has been much behind the others in its deliberations and which only as recently as ist November has submitted its proposals as
as a result of a unanimous resolution of the Council.
5.
The rates provided by these two sets of proposals fit in with those provided by the Orders I have already made for the other sections of the retail trades under the Cabinet authority of 29th August. Indeed, there are instances where the rates in these proposals are lower than the corresponding rates in the Orders. Whether judged by reference to the rates fixed for the lowest class of labour in the older Wages Councils (Trade Board) Trades, or by reference to the present cost of living, the rates proposed, which are set out in the
are on a modest scale. annexed table,
6.
I realise, of course, that notwithstanding any decision reached before 18th September, it is highly necessary that any proposals now received should be considered in the wider context of our discussions on a standstill for wages. The arguments against confirmation as I see them are as follows.
710
These proposals are bound to be described as wage increases, even although in fact only a small percentage of workers will be affected, and the proposals do no more than con- firm the voluntary rates already in existence in the larger stores and undertakings. Opponents of the wage restraint policy may point to these cases as showing that the Government will not themselves take the responsibility for enforcing a standstill and that in any case the fact that these Orders are made will show that the restraint, even if the Government desire it, is not absolute.
8.
It may also be urged that this is not the time to embark on another large field of wage regulation when clearly the existence of full employment is sufficient to guarantee the workers their rates,
9.
Despite the so arguments, I am of the opinion that this case and that of the Furnishing and Allied Trades can be, and should be, treated as exceptional and as being outside the question of general wage stabilisation. These, as already pointed out, formed two of the eight trades whose cases were considered by the Cabinet in August, and they form a part of the complete pattern of the retail distributive trades. There is no doubt in my mind that the decision of principle which the Cabinet took on 29th August applied to these two as to the other six trades. It is only an accident of time that the reconsidered proposals have become available after 18th September rather than before that date. I am satisfied, therefore, that those proposals can be dealt with and the implementation of the Cabinet decision of principle of 29th August completed without prejudice either to the general stabilisation policy or to the treatment which, within that policy, is to be accorded to the lower paid workers.
10.
The alternative to confirming the proposals will be to leave two sections of the workers employed in retail distri- bution without the safeguard which has now been afforded to the other six sections. If the proposals are not confirmed, a serious breach will have been made in the policy of providing safeguards to the lower paid unorganised workers in retail disPage 700af1097h otherwise would have blage70att097as a result of the Government's action since 1945.
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