15 SEPTEMBER 1923, Page 21

Mr. G. H. D. Cole and Miss Elinor Bums, who

have written this book, describe it as a survey of the present position of Labour and of Capital. The state of the trade unions is depicted in the gloomiest light, while the capitalists are said to have retained "a greater proportion of the country's real wealth than in 1013." Russia, we are told, "is probably the only country in which there has been an important Improvement during 1922, on a basis which promises continued improvement "—a statement which would surprise no one more than the Bolshevik despots of Moscow. The book is simply propaganda for the advanced _wing of the Labour Party, and in no sense the dispassionate product of genuine research, as its title would suggest.