【正文】 nings to decline relative to the average for manufacturing industry as a whole and has resulted in the closure of many mills and entire panies. In addition, the production process is still quite laborintensive with the result that productivity as measured by net output per employee pares unfavorably with other industries. In short, both the industry and the union are in a state of severe decline and it is this decline which provides the backcloth to our study of information disclosure in a collective bargaining context. Structured interviews using a precoded questionnaire were conducted with sixteen out of the eighteen District Secretaries in post during August and September 1979. The content of the questionnaire was initially determined from the normative models of trade union decision making found in Cooper and Essex and Foley and Maunders Subsequently, a pilot survey of three District Secretaries was carried out to identify the most mon decision areas and information sources for inclusion in the main questionnaire. The pilot survey also ensured that no major decision areas or information sources which may have been specific to trade union officials in the Lancashire cotton industry were accidentally omitted. The final questionnaire used in the structured interviews identified seven sources of information which were available for use by the District Secretaries and these sources are presented very few panies in the Lancashire cotton industry publish employee reports and consequently only five District Secretaries could recall ever receiving copies directly from any of the panies in their District. Once again, it was the large or publicly quoted panies which produced and sent out employee reports to the District Secretaries and, just as for the published annual reports, the information was presented only for the group as a whole. All the District Secretaries who received a pany39。s employee report also received its published accounts and most of them considered that there was very little information in the former. Although both published accounts and employee reports suffer from a high level of aggregation, the same is not true for the other sources of information in Table 2. Internal accounting reports and order books contain information about individual panies or mills, while work study reports provide details relevant to a single shed within a mill or even a group of machines. The pattern of disclosure for internal accounting reports and order books was remarkably similar. All the District Secretaries reported that most panies allowed them access to internal accounting information and to information about the quantity and value of future orders. However, only one District Secretary said that he received this information without having to make a specific request and there were a few panies, again small, privatelyowned ones, who consistently refused to disclose this information. Under the provisions of the Employment Protection Act, 1975 and the related ACAS Code of Practice No. 2, 1977,panies are required to disclose all information requested by trade union representatives which would not cause substantial injury to the pany. It appears that some of the small panies were taking advantage of this exclusion clause on the grounds that the information was confidential and could, if made publicly available, reduce the petitiveness of the pany. The District Secretaries who had been refused information on these grounds never took the issue further, for example to the Central Arbitration Committee of ACAS, because they were usually able to estimate the information they required from other sources, often from direct observation of the production in the mill. Although most District Secretaries had access to information from the internal accounting reports and order books of panies in their District, the type of access given, in effect the nature of the disclosure, differed between panies. Most panies were willing to give verbal summaries of the information requested, for example profits for the month, but very few panies allowed the District Secretaries directly to inspect the documents themselves. The provision of only verbal summaries of these reports prevented the District Secretaries from undertaking any detailed analysis of their contents, perhaps with the aid of an independent expert, and consequently may have reduced the extent to which these information sources were used in their decision making. Secretary who often calls in the ATWU39。s own work study officer to verify management39。s figures. It is, therefore, in management39。s interest that the District Secretaries regularly receive the work study reports which monitor the actual performance of the operatives. To summarize, the quality of information disclosure in the Lancashire cotton industry, as measured by the responses of the District Secretaries, does not appear to be uniform either across information sources or across panies. Where the provision of information is essential for the smooth operation of the productive process, namely the work study reports, or where the provision of information is virtually costless, as is the case for the published accounts and employee reports of large or quoted panies, the quality of disclosure is generally very high. In contrast, there is less disclosure about information which is considered by management to be sensitive or confidential, namely internal accounting reports and order books, particularly by small, privately owned panies. Nevertheless, the deficiencies in the amount of disclosure by panies may not be a serious limitation to the District Secretaries in their decision making, since much of the information contained in these reports can be derived from other sources, for example, direct observation, munications from members or other District Secretaries, and informal discussions with management. The relative importance of these information so