STATISTICS AND ADMINISTRATION. 445
Other Periodical Returns.
Annual returns are also issued by provincial Governments in
connection with the Workmen's Compensation Act and the Trade
Unions Act. These are accompanied by statistics relating to the pay-
ment of workmen’s compensation and to registered trade unions. The
former statistics cover the main branches of industry and are summarised
annually by the Government of India with some comments on the
working of the Act. We recommend that for the convenience of the
public a similar summary be published relating to the Trade Unions
Act. The Government of India also publish statistics of industrial
disputes. These are supplied by provincial Governments, some of which
publish the figures for their provinces. The tables, prepared on a
monthly basis but issued quarterly, give the number of disputes, the
number of persons involved, the principal causes and the general
results.
The Need of Statistical Information.
The periodical statistics to which we have referred are designed
mainly for administrative purposes and throw little light on the
economic position of the worker. Even if they were supplemented in
respect of wages in the manner we have suggested, they could not take
the place of regular statistics of earnings and of the worker’s expenditure,
We have already referred to the limited information available in respect
of the standard of living of the industrial classes, and we have stressed
the importance of taking steps to remedy the present deficiency. There
seems to be an impression in some quarters that the collection of such
statistics is a luxury in which only rich countries or provinces should
indulge. This, in our view, is a profound error. It is on facts that
policy must be built, and so long as there is uncertainty as to the facts,
there must be confusion and conflict regarding the aim. The absence of
accurate statistics regarding the life of the workers constitutes a serious
handicap to intelligent efforts to better their condition.

Wages.
The three main subjects on which information is most urgently
needed are wages, earnings and the expenditure of the workers. So far
as wages are concerned, practically nothing has hitherto been achieved
with the exception of the enquiries made by the Bombay Labour Office
into wages in the cotton mill industry of that Presidency. An attempt
was made by the Government of India to institute a wages census in 1921,
but retrenchment led to its abandonment. Satisfactory statistics regard-
ing wages can only be obtained from employers and must be collected on a
fairly extensive scale on the basis of individual industries. The pos-
sibilities of working on samples are very limited ; in its last and most
slaborate enquiry the Bombay Labour Office depended on sampling, but
the sample taken was a very large one. In most Indian industries there
would seem to be wide variations in wages, and even in their methods
of calculation and payment, from establishment to establishment in the