BRITISH AGRICULTURE

Evening Star, Issue 18256, 21 April 1923, Page 4

BRITISH AGRICULTURE

LABOR’S WAGES KEPT SIP. NORFOLK STRIKE MAY END. Press Association —By Telegraph—Copyright. LONDON, April 20. Mr Harry Gumrui, president .of the Farmers’ Union, and Mr Harry Gosling, Labor M.P. and president of the Transporters’ Federation, are the mediators in tho Norfolk farm labor dispute. ‘ They have reached a provisional agreement in connection with tho strike. This provides that a. wage of 25s a week shall be paid on a guaranteed 54-hour week, plus 6d an hour up to fifty-four hours, and overtime, rates thereafter. Tho work must be so arranged as to provide a weekly half-holiday. The Cheshire Conciliation Committee decided to continue till September with a minimum wage of 32s for a 54-hour week. Farmers have become less intractable since the announcement of the Government’s reductions on the rating of agricultural landalso since they will bo the class to receive most of the benefit from the cuts in the goods rates on the railways, amounting to £9,000,000 a year. The railway companies decided to-day that the reduced rates would become operative as from May 1. Mr Ramsay MacDonald was largely responsible for bringing the parties together for a settlement of the farm strike.—A. and N.Z. Cable.