An Act of deception
The public is undoubtedly under the impression, deliberately created by Ministers Of the Crown led by the Prime Minister, that as a result Of recent legislation it is against the law for wages Ito be increased, except in occasional, specified cases. On November 30, the Counter-Inflation (Temporary Provisions) Bill was enacted; and it is this statute which, so it is said, and so it is believed by the vast majority of the country, who appear to have been deliberately deceived in the matter, made it the law that "Prices or charges . . shall not exceed the prices or charges for transactions of the same description effected by the same person in the course of business before 6th November 1972," and that "An employer shall not pay remuneration. . . at a rate which exceeds the rate of remuneration paid by him for the same kind of work before 6th November 1972." This might be thought — and indeed is thought --to be clear enough.
The Government is now busy taking its more permanent legislation — the Counter-Inflation Bill — through the Committee Stage of the House of Commons. This stage began on Monday Of this week. The object Of the Bill is to set up a Prices Commission and an Incomes Board which will be supposed to control pries, wages, profits, salaries, dividends and rents according to a Code. It might be thought to be generally desirable that the forty Members of Parliament engaged in the detailed scrutiny of the Bill should know the provisions Of the Code which the agencies which the Bill is designed to create will operate. But on Monday; when pressed by Mr John Grant, the Labour member for Islington East, and former industrial correspondent of the Daily Express, the Minister for Employment, Mr Maurice Macmillan, told the Committee that the Code would not be available to them during the weeks they were discussing the Bill. Mr Andrew Alexander, of the Daily Mail, reported spiritedly not only the absence of this Code, but also the absence from the opening meeting of the Committee Stage Of any Minister from the Department Of Trade and Industry (which is supposed to be administering price controls) or of 'any 'Minister from Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (whiCh is supposed Ito be keeping dolwn food prices). The forty Members of Parliament condutting the Comimittee Stage will surely conclude from the absente of the Code and of the Ministers that they are being treated with contempt by the Administration; and if they put up with such treatment, then 'the public will be entitled to conclude that they deserve that contempt.
These are not technical points., nor are they debating points. The contempt in which Mr Heath's Government holds the House Of Commons and the public is best shown by the manner in which it has led or, more accurately, misled people into believing that its Counter4nfiation (Temporary Provisions) Act of last November, which the present Counter-Inflation Bill is designed to follow without any lacuna in between, has legally frozen wages and prices. In the passages from that Act quoted above we omitted the essential provisions which the Act makes: that "Prices or charges to which this section applies" and "remuneration to which this section applies" shall not exceed what they were on November 6, 1972. Similar clauses, with similar provisions, apply to dividends and rents. But the general public has read these sub-sections Of the vital Section 2 of the Act as if these words were missing. And the Government 'has employed its propaganda also as if these words were missing. The almost universally held conclusion is that there is a general law which orders that prices, charges and wages may not be increased. There is no such general law, although there is no doubt at all that the Government, and many of its senior civil servants in Whitehall, would like us to believe that there is. After the four sub-sections dealing with prices and charges, remuneration, dividends, and rents, subsection 5 then says that the appropriate Minister may apply the section to prices and charges, to remuneration, 'and to companies; and sub-section 6 says: "The power conferred by sub-section (5) above shall be exercisable by order, or by notice given to the person, or each of the persons, to whom this section is to apply." In other words, until an • order is made or written notice given none of the relevant parts of section 2 applies to any prices, charges, dividends or rents.
What orders have been made, so far as wages are concerned? The relevant statutory instruments appear to be 1972 no. 1848, 1972 no. 2042, and 1973 no. 98. These freeze agricultural wages, certain wages in the electrical contracting industry, and wages for assistant stage managers or deputy stage managers for theatre performances in the West End of London and on pre-London and post-London tours thereof. Orders have also been made freezing dividends, business rents, agricultural rents, and the remuneration for services which contribute to 'programmes of the BBC. It is also possible that a number of notices have 'been given, as provided for in sub-section 6; to discover their number and extent demands a detailed search through the London Gazette, where it is required that such notices be published. The Act 'also contains penalties for contraventions of section 2, but section 2 can only be contravened after it has been made to apply — that is, after an order has been made or a notice given and published.
There is evidence of some civil servants telling employers that they are not to pay increases they want to pay, when they are fully entitled, as the law stands, to pay them. In other cases, civil servants, when asked for an opinion, have declined to give answers. It may be wondered why the Government has not issued 'a mass of statutory instruments, or why, on the other hand, it did not legislate in a general manner. The only answer which springs readily to mind is that the Government wants to give the impression that wages are frozen, without actually making statutory instruments to this effect except where this is unavoidable. That is, the Government does not want to run the risk of the law being broken and men punished on a massive stale. And in all this, the civil service appears to be conspiring with the Government in what is, in. law and in fact, an Act of deception.
Previous page
