The Financial Times of December 2nd carried an editorial which we reproduce: (Ed. Notes our emphasis throughout)
"The referenca of the National Incomes Commission of last week's settlemont in the onginesring industry will provide Nicky with its most important work so far. ‘Some 34. workers are beli©Vod to be covered by the engineering settlement; and it is known that most, if not all, the workers in the industry get wages a gocd deal sbove the minimim rates. Iut the structure of the industry, and of wage rates inside it, is - complex one; sorting out who these 3n. workers are, estinating the plus payments they are already receiving, and — most of all — attempting to -find cut whether the various sections of the industry have increased productivity to an extent which justifies an awerd above the “guiding light" will be a herculean task.
"Thero are two ways of locking at this roference, First, it can be seen, as the Chancellor was half hinting that it night be seen, as a piece of basic research work; Nicky will be drawing up a picture of the imdstry, and of large firms like Vauxhall and Fords which flank it, which will be useful for many years in evaluating the economic significance of what, after all, is the country's largest wage clains On this basis, the investigation is likely to be a success.e...-in investigation by Nicky, cimed purely at "“clarifiing the economic issues" would be a valuable exercise.
“Dut few people, lonst of oll the trade unions, will be inclined to see the National Incomes Commission's work in quite this light. It is, more or less directly, designed to stop the wage award to engineers spreading to — railwaynen, busmen. shipbuilders and other categories of workers whose pay is tradition ly linked to that of the engineers, Such ao spread cannot with certainty be stopped even with the help of Nicky,...But what the Government is hoping = as it hoped without success when the 34 -settlement was announced at Ford = is that tho investigation will highlight such facts as the fast rise in engineering productivity and the longer period than usual between sottlements, Such facts would, it is hoped make the engineering award appear a spocial case, and not one to set a precedent for a large part of industry.
",...The plain fact about wage settlements is that they go up when business improves — at the least, employers want to make a settlement quickly so as not to face bargaining in a tighter labour market -— and go down when business is slack. Beyond this, it is true that Nicky, by interposing another procedure through which a union settlement must go, slightly tilts the balance of bargaining power towards the enployers; and, it probably Slightly Poduces The sizo of the clains that the uriohs make and that the enployers are prepared to concede. The building settlement was . case in point, Tut the total result,...is probably marginal, ind it is not achiev ed without cost,
"This cost is simply union co-operation in other fiolds of business, and especially on Neddy, In order not to disturb relationships there, the Government has been treading somewhat anxiously with the Incomes Commissiony but the present reference, just before the union elections of Sir William Carron and several members of his team in the 4.8.U., is not likely to make things easier, Dut it would be worthwhile, on one condition - which is that the Government now turns its mind to some of the equally effective, but evan less easy, ways in which the spread of the enginooring settlement can be stopped. One would be for the Minister of Labour to amnounce in public thet the shipmilders should not follow on from the engineers, Another would bo to face ee a railwe strike rather than give a lar; increase