As a result of the negotiations, an agreement was completed on March 20, 1920,[15] providing for standardization of rates of pay, for wages to rise and fall according to cost of living, and for a standard rate below which wages should not fall. This is one of the most important industrial agreements. The principle of the arrangement was as follows. There were many classes of men on different railways graded by different names and receiving different rates of pay although doing substantially the same work. These various classes were reduced into a small number of specified grades. Further, in regard to certain grades, the country was divided up into sections, for example: (1) London area; (2) provincial, industrial and mining areas and large towns, and (3) rural districts. Then, on a system of averages, the mean pre-war weekly rate of pay of the men of a particular grade on all the railways in a particular section of the country was ascertained; to that a sum of 38_s._ as war-wage was added. This combined sum was to form, as from January 1, 1920, the wage to be paid as long as the cost of living remained at 125 per cent. above pre-war cost of living. For every five points rise or fall in the cost of living there was to be an increase or reduction of 1_s._ per week. Standard or minimum rates were fixed representing generally 100 per cent. increase on the average pre-war rates of the respective grades. These were rates below which wages would not fall, however much the cost of living might go down. This agreement provided on a more fully developed basis for a Central Wages Board of ten members, five representing railway administration and five the Unions, and for an appellate or National Wages Board of twelve members, four representing the railway companies, four the Unions and four the users of the railways, with an independent Chairman appointed by the Government. In promulgating the settlement the Government made this announcement: “In dealing with questions of wages it has been kept clearly in view by the Government that some addition to railway wages was due before the war, and that the claims of the railwaymen to a higher standard of remuneration were only then postponed because of the country’s necessities.” After this agreement certain claims for improvements in pay and working conditions were submitted by the Unions to the Central Wages Board, and, on the latter’s failing to agree, referred to the National Wages Board. The Board by a majority agreed that certain advances of wages should be given, but they said they could not be justified on the ground of increase in the cost of living as that was provided for by an automatic advance under the sliding scale. The Government agreed to the advances being given.