The behaviour of the National Incomes Commission is beginning to reveal a somewhat subtle intelligence, which needs marking by the Labour Movement. This distinctly backhanded compliment is not intended as a form of thanks for the very substantial increase in university salaries of whichnic has rather unexpectedly proved the architect: but as a warning of things to come which must be heeded by the unions if they are not to suffer substantial reverses. For the careful manoeuvres of nic, in a situation in which it has no legitimate powers over unions, are already proving to be a calculated nuisance to them: how much more effectively malignant will be the incomes policies which are about to be wished on the unions by all sorts of individuals and forces who should know better?

nic’s first public foray into its appointed field was the report on the Scottish Plumbers’ and Builders’ agreements of 1962. The thin edge of its now most obvious wedge was then exposed, in the form of its fierce strictures on the 40-hour week. ‘Reduction in hours must be judged for what it in fact is’ intimated this document—‘namely a means of increasing wages’. Yet the deterrent effect of this discovery on other groups of employers was to prove marginal. It is in the period since last November, in which it has been devoting, or threatening to devote, its attention to the Shipbuilding and Engineering settlement of that month, that nic has given evidences of its developing tactical awareness. Ostensibly, the Commission has the right to ponder on agreed settlements which the Chancellor refers to it. In fact, with the reference of this particular major settlement to it, the Commission has found a tongue with which to speak on a whole range of general issues, over which it has brooded with lingering detachment until at convenient intervals a statement has seemed useful to it.

At the beginning of February, the Confederation of Shipbuilding and Engineering Unions was due to meet the Engineering Employers’ Federation on a claim for a 40-hour week for three million workers. Five days before the meeting, there appeared in print a 35,000 word memorandum from the Treasury to nic, published as part of the written evidence which was to be considered by the Commission from the end of the month on. Although the Commission was charged to consider the effects of the November settlement, the Treasury statement uninhibitedly expatiated in full on the inflationary effects of a phased introduction of a 40-hour week in engineering. It also discussed in detailed terms the incidence of wage-drift, or the gap between actual earnings and agreed rates of pay, in the industry. As the Financial Times pointed out in its lead story of the day: ‘the Government has issued what amounts to a warning to the employers not to give way.’ The meeting took place, and after it, in due time, the labours of the Commission commenced.