being compelled to accept wages substantially less than the current standard.  I therefore welcome the gradual extension of the Trade Board system, provided it follows the general principle recommended in the Cave Report—­that the community should use its full powers of compulsion only in regard to the minimum, and that so far as all other classes of wages are concerned, the State should encourage collective bargaining.  With this proviso, compulsory enforcement of a minimum could also be extended to the workpeople covered by Whitley Councils.

As regards all wages above the minimum the Cave Committee recommended that, provided they are reached by agreement on the Board, and provided that a sufficiently large proportion of the Board concur, the wage so determined shall be enforced by civil process, whereas in the cases of the minimum, the rates would be determined if necessary by arbitration of the State-appointed members of the Board, and non-payment would be a penal offence.  The Trade Boards now cover three million workers.  Two million are in occupations for which Trade Boards are under consideration, and there are a further two million under Industrial Councils or Whitley Councils.  If State powers are to be employed in trades employing seven millions of the eighteen million wage-earners of the country, the scope of those powers needs to be very carefully defined.

THE CASE FOR PROFIT-SHARING

Many Liberals are, however, asking whether this is sufficient and whether it is not possible for the State to intervene to alter the distribution of the product of industry in favour of the wage-earner.  In particular, they are wondering whether it is possible to secure the universal application of some system of profit-sharing.  The underlying principle of profit-sharing is indeed one which we must look to if the whole-hearted assistance of labour is to be enlisted behind the productive effort of the country.  But the profit we have to consider is the profit over which the worker has some influence.  There is no merit in inviting him to share in purely commercial profits or losses which may be due to some one else’s speculation or business foresight.  It is futile to imagine you can reverse the functions of labour and capital, and say that capital should have a fixed wage, and that the employee should bear all the risks of the industry.

Again, in some cases it is suitable that profits should be considered in regard to a whole industry, but in others only in regard to a particular firm or section; and finally the rate of profit suitable to various trades varies between very wide limits.  In short, there can be no universal rule in this matter which can be enforced by Act of Parliament.