First, there ought to be ascertained the wages which the industry is economically able to pay at the then prevailing market prices for its product; we may conveniently call them “ability wages.” They cannot be determined by picking out and assuming as typical—a frequent stratagem of Labour—individual firms which are making substantial profits. The industry must be taken on a national, it may be sometimes on a district basis, extreme cases at both ends of the scale ruled out, and a proper estimate struck on methods of accountancy, making due allowance for the trade outlook and for all the expenses and risks present and prospective, which, from the conditions of the industry in question, fall upon the employers. Labour insists on the Trade Union rate of wages being paid by all firms, whether making large profits or none at all. To consider therefore the industry as a whole is equitable. Employers making exceptional profits cannot be taken as norms for wages; so far as their gains are contrary to public policy, they can only be dealt with by a “wise and wary Chancellor of the Exchequer.” That an “ability to pay” estimate can be prepared in respect of an industry by competent joint accountants on a basis convincing to Labour has more than once come prominently within my own practical experience. The great point is to prove to the workers that they are getting a fair share of the product of industry under its then existing conditions. It is much more important to satisfy them on that point than to pay them a high wage. If they get a higher wage than the industry can pay, and are not satisfied, they will firmly believe that a still higher wage could and ought to be paid. There is only one way to prove the equity of the wage—to put all the cards on the table, and show the Trade Union representatives at the conference what the exact conditions of the industry are, and what are the maximum wages which the industry as a whole can pay. Secondly, an exact statement is required of the wages paid in other industries to workers comparable with the workers in the industry in question—these may be termed “comparable wages.” They are obtainable from statistics compiled by the Ministry of Labour, but not published in collated form.