ELIMINATION  OF  MINOR  FORMS  OF  WASTE  I  29
be  of  real  assistance  in  a  community  where  there  exists
no  general  over-supply  of  productive  power.
§  3.  The  Elimination  of  Minor  Forms  of  Waste.
In  order  that  Labour  Bureaux  may  successfully  operate
as  Clearing  Houses  it  is  of  course  essential  that  they
should  possess  the  confidence  alike  of  genuine  workingmen ­
  and  of  employers.  Arising  in  many  cases  in  connection ­
  with  Relief  Work  they  have  remained  on  a  semiphilanthropic
  or  charitable  footing,  failing  to  draw  or  to
deserve  the  application  of  employers  in  search  of  the  best
available  labour,  and  also  failing  to  induce  skilled  and
capable  workers  to  have  regular  recourse  to  them  as  a  means
of  getting  good  and  remunerative  employment.  Whether
the  Labour  Bureau  should  itself  undertake  to  ascertain
the  industrial  character  and  qualifications  of  applicants,
confining  itself  to  the  register  of  sound  cases,  or  whether
it  should  pursue  the  general  policy  of  registering  all
comers,  is  a  disputed  point.  The  difficulties  attending
character-enquiry  and  the  distrust  it  not  unnaturally  engenders ­
  seem  to  favour  the  perfectly  free  register,  though
every  facility  might  be  afforded  for  the  collection  and
communication  of  such  information  as  would  enable  both
parties  to  a  bargain  to  understand  the  nature  of  the
contract  upon  which  they  entered.  If  the  Labour  Bureau
were  in  every  centre  of  population  recognised  as  an  important ­
  public  institution  conducted  on  sound  business
principles,  it  would  probably  gain  the  confidence  of  all
classes  of  employers  and  workers  who  were  in  need  of
each  other  and  found  the  ordinary  private  modes  of
meeting  inadequate.
The  Labour  Bureau  might  of  course  with  great  advan-9