CRISIS CRESCENDO
If the truth of the situation really does strike home, and if its realisation is immediately followed by a large increase in output, there is still time to avert a crash. But one of the main troubles is that between the will and imagination of the workers and the urgent warnings of the Government, backed unanimously by the economists and all other intelligent observers, is the feather-bed of the T.U.C. and its constituent unions. There can be no mistake about what the T.U.C. is doing at this moment. It is procrastinating. What is more, it has been procrastinating for years on this crucial question of wages policy. It was in April, 1946, that an official T.U.C. memorandum attacked the very idea of a national wages policy as "academic and unconvincing," and that was by no means the first time that it had been done. Now that some such policy has been adopted by the Government such an attack is no longer possible, but the new campaign of evasion and postponement can be equally dangerous ; in fact, more so now that neglect has caused the situation to become critical. What is wanted now from the T.U.C. is not still further requests for time to consider a matter which it has considered ad nauseam (other people's nauseam), but prompt and bold action to restrain those unions who have already indicated that they will press their claims for higher wages irrespective of output. Still more vigorous action will be required to scotch the activities of Communists within the unions who have seized upon this oppor- tunity to pose as the guardians of wage standards while working for unrestrained inflation and consequent economic disaster.
Realism also requires that specific measures shall be at least suggested, if they cannot be outlined in detail in advance of the Budget, for restraining any rise in distributed profits which cannot be linked with a corresponding rise in productivity. Although income other than wages accounts for only one-third of the national total, and a check on it may be therefore less significant absolutely than a check on wages, there is no case in equity for ignoring rises in profits, and it is quite certain that no wages stop will be accepted without a profits stop. But that is a rather different matter from any further increase in the burden of taxation which profits already bear. Finally, there must be fewer brave words and more decided action in the matter of Marshall aid. If the assertion that we are not counting on it absolutely is to be justified then our policy makers must stop behaving as if we were counting on it. The central truth is that, Marshall aid or no Marshall aid, we are in danger of inflation at home and breakdown abroad. Consequently, any obstacles to a policy of steady prices and rising output must be removed at once, and the most serious of these obstacles is the equivocal attitude of the T.U.C.
