him, there is no fear of a breach of the Truck Act. As Treasurer of the Board, I have always found that the best-managed works are those which remit their contributions most regularly.

When the Operatives' Section of the Standing Committee has to deal with a very important question affecting the interests of the whole body of workmen, they get the views of that body by calling a meeting of these Operatives' Works Representatives, who are intimate with every man in the works they represent.

Of the Employers' Secretary, as I hold that office, I ought to speak with abated breath. But, if I were a non-official person, speaking with the knowledge gained by my experience, I should repeat what I wrote to M. Lozé, a French gentleman who was making inquiries about the establishment and working of Wages Boards. His question was, "Can you kindly name the difficulties encountered in their establishment and working?" Of the Employers' Secretary I said, "He is usually chosen from among the head-clerks of an employer's office. The atmosphere of the counting-house, where discounts, percentages, costs, and wages' settlements go on day by day, is not often the atmosphere in which a very generous disposition is engendered. Possibly not feeling very assured of his own position, he may feel touchy and sensitive as to the bearing towards him of others, especially the working man. He is liable to take offence at what he may consider familiarity, or if he be of a conceited nature, he may give offence by his treatment of the operative. Again, although he should have a knowledge of the trade and manufacturing processes, it is not desirable that he should be in the service of any of the employers. Being bound hand and foot, with no freedom of action, in that position, the operatives would be suspicious of his views and actions.

They would feel they were not his own, but subject to his employer."

I think you want a well-educated man, that he should have seen something of the world and travelled; a man of large ideas, and somewhat smitten with the spirit of humanitarianism. He should be a master of accounts. The difficulty will be to know how to win the confidence of the Operatives' Secretary, and through him that of the workmen. I can only indicate the way by saying, that he must be absolutely candid and truthful; there must be no dissimulation. He must be in the presence of the employers what he is before the operatives. He must be strong enough to tell an employer that he is doing wrong, if that should be the case. His conduct and manner of life must be beyond suspicion. He must make it a study to win the workman's confidence and respect. Quarrels between the two sides of the Board may easily be hatched between the two secretaries, and unless the greatest cordiality and confidence exists between them, the Board will not work smoothly.

The admirable influence of a wise and discreet president or chairman is reflected upon the whole body which tries to imitate what it admires.

The Employers' Secretary carries with him a responsible position, and it is perhaps a more difficult post to fill because there are not persons in the field who are being trained up to it. The school is the Standing Committee. Employer members are not likely to accept the position if it were offered to them; they have other avocations, and are too closely allied with the employers' interests to escape the suspicion of unfair bias, and yet they are the only people on the employers' side who are receiving the training. It is not an occupation which can be immediately taken up with success without preparation.

The effect of this widespread organization is, that each individual workman knows that he has a tribunal to which he has a right to refer any real grievance, or any proper subject for ventilation or information. The result is, suspicious and imaginary wrongs disappear. He knows that it is useless to raise questions that are ill-founded. He has his mind filled with the thought of the Board and its working, which is ever present to him, and he soon realizes how great a good it is for him to support it. This confidence begets a disposition to be obedient to its rulings.

That such is the result is manifest from numberless cases in which the operatives have asked for the ruling of the Board and have willingly submitted to them. I have known employers leave the Board because a decision was not in their favour, but I have never yet heard of a workman leaving for such a reason.

Whilst boards of the character I am describing are well adapted to large trades, they would be too expensive to be employed in many small trades, and for such the municipal conciliation boards are useful. They, however, lack the educational element. Boards of the type of the coal trade conciliation boards and sliding scale committees, and the working of the Conciliation (Trades Disputes) Act of 1896, are all wanting in the advantages of thorough organization. They do not reach each. workman in the trade affected. In fact, there is no membership, no evidence of membership, by paying contributions, however small.

Danger arises when the representatives on a Wages Board are mere delegates and only voice the majority of a mass meeting of workmen who have not heard the evidence or the argument. It is essential that the representatives should be free to exercise their own judgment and the good sense and uprightness for

which they have been chosen-otherwise those qualities are of no service.

The organization of the Midland Iron and Steel Wages Board is as follows:

President.

Chairman of Standing Committee.

Vice-Chairman of Standing Committee.

Employers' Secretary.

Operatives' Secretary.

Treasurer.

Accountant for the sliding scale.
Auditor.

The Standing Committee has thirteen employer members and thirteen operative members.

The Sub-Committee (which deals with minor matters) has four employer and four operative members. Every ironworks connected with the Board has an Employers' and an Operatives' Representative, who are elected annually.

The rules of the Board are printed and circulated.

The minutes of proceedings of the Standing Committee are printed and circulated immediately after the meetings.

Wages are settled every two months under a sliding scale. A copy of the accountant's return, together with a statement showing the quantity made of each class of iron, the percentage of the total for each class, the average net selling price of each, and the average net selling price of the whole, is printed and sent to each of the works. The results of the ascertainment are also published in the local newspapers, so that every workman may have full information.

There is in South Wales a committee formed for the regulation of the sheet mills working under the South Staffordshire Sheet Mill Wages Schedule,

has some special rules of its own, to provide for local customs; but, apart from those special rules, it is subject to the rules of the Midland Board. In case of disagreement, they have the right to refer any question to the Standing Committee of the Midland Board or its President. The spirit which has prompted the Midland Board to permit the affiliation of this Welsh Board with it, has been that of recognizing a public duty to advance the cause of conciliation as a principle for the settlement of labour disputes.

An important instrument in the working of the Board is the Sheet Mill Wages Schedule. The necessity for having such a schedule arose from the various employers paying different rates for the same class of work. The consequence was a constant endeavour for the higher rates to be reduced and the lower rates to be raised, and thus dissatisfaction on both sides was maintained. The Wages Board appointed a Sheet Mill Wages Committee to form a schedule of rates for sheetiron rolling and the work associated with it, which should be binding upon all employers and operatives in the South Staffordshire and Shropshire sheet mills. An average of the whole of the rates paid was taken, and wages were based upon it. Only a Wages Board could have accomplished this task; it could never have been done on the old system of each of the works settling their own affairs. It is highly creditable to both sides, for each had to make concessions, which were submitted to without demur.

The sliding scale is in use as one of the means of regulating wages. It has always been urged by arbitrators, before whom a question of wages has been submitted, that a sliding scale should be established. The sliding scale in the iron trade was formulated by Mr. G. B. Thorneycroft fifty or sixty years since. He