Page:EB1911 - Volume 16.djvu/30

Rh course revised under the amended procedure of the act of 1901. They might not only regulate conditions of employment, but also restrict or prohibit employment of any class of workers; where such restriction or prohibition affected adult workers the rules had to be laid for forty days before both Houses of Parliament before coming into operation. The obligation to observe the rules in detail lies on workers as well as on occupiers, and the section in the act of 1891 providing a penalty for non-observance was drafted, as in the case of the mines, so as to provide for a simultaneous fine for each (not exceeding two pounds for the worker, not exceeding ten pounds for the employer).

The provisions as to special regulations of the act of 1901 touch primarily the method of procedure for making the regulations, but they also covered for the first time domestic workshops and added a power as to the kind of regulations that may be made; further, they strengthened the sanction for observance of any rules that may be established, by placing the occupier in the same general position as regards penalty for non-observance as in other matters under the act. On the certificate of the secretary of state that any manufacture, machinery, plant, process or manual labour used in factories or workshops is dangerous or injurious to life, health or limb, such regulations as appear to the secretary of state to meet the necessity of the case may be made by him after he has duly published notice: (1) of his intention; (2) of the place where copies of the draft regulations can be obtained; and (3) of the time during which objections to them can be made by persons affected. The secretary of state may modify the regulations to meet the objections made. If not, unless the objection is withdrawn or appears to him frivolous, he shall, before making the regulations, appoint a competent person to hold a public inquiry with regard to the draft regulations and to report to him thereon. The inquiry is to be made under such rules as the secretary of state may lay down, and when the regulations are made, they must be laid as soon as possible before parliament. Either House may annul these regulations or any of them, without prejudice to the power of the secretary of state to make new regulations. The regulations may apply to all factories or workshops in which the certified manufacture, process, &c., is used, or to a specified class. They may, among other things, (a) prohibit or limit employment of any person or class of persons; (b) prohibit, limit, or control use of any material or process; (c) modify or extend special regulations contained in the Act. Regulations have been established among others in the following trades and processes: felt hat-making where any inflammable solvent is used; file-cutting by hand; manufacture of electric accumulators; docks, processes of loading, unloading, &c.; tar distilling; factories in which self-acting mules are used; use of locomotives; spinning and weaving of flax, hemp and jute; manufacture of paints and colours; heading of yarn dyed by means of lead compounds.

Although the Factory and Workshop Acts have not directly regulated wages, they have made certain provision for securing to the worker that the amount agreed upon shall be received: (a) by extending every act in force relating to the inspection of weights, measures and weighing machines for use

in the sale of goods to those used in a factory or workshop for checking or ascertaining the wages of persons employed; (b) by ensuring that piece-workers in the textile trades (and other trades specified by the secretary of state) shall receive, before commencing any piece of work, clear particulars of the wages applicable to the work to be done and of the work to which that rate is to be applied. Unless the particulars of work are ascertainable by an automatic indicator, they must be given to textile workers in writing, and in the case of weavers in the cotton, worsted and woollen trades the particulars of wages must be supplied separately to each worker, and also shown on a placard in a conspicuous position. In other textile processes, it is sufficient to furnish the particulars separately to each worker. The secretary of state has used his powers to extend this protection to non-textile workers, with suitable modifications, in various hardware industries, including pen-making, locks, chains, in wholesale tailoring and making of wearing apparel, in fustian cutting, umbrella-making, brush-making and a number of other piece-work trades. He further has in most of these and other trades used his power to extend this protection to outworkers.

With a view to efficient administration of the act (a) certain notices have to be conspicuously exhibited at the factory or workshop, (b) registers and lists kept, and (c) notices sent to the inspector by the occupier. Among the first the most important are the prescribed abstract of the act,

the names and addresses of the inspector and certifying surgeon, the period of employment, and specified meal-times (which may not be changed without fresh notice to the inspector), the air space and number of persons who may legally be employed in each room, and prescribed particulars of exceptional employment; among the second are the general registers of children and young persons employed, of accidents, of limewashing, of overtime, and lists of outworkers; among the third are the notice of beginning to occupy a factory or workshop, which the occupier must send within one month, report of overtime employment, notice of accident, poisoning or anthrax, and returns of persons employed, with such other particulars as may be prescribed. These must be sent to the chief inspector at intervals of not less than one and not more than three years, as may be directed by the secretary of state.

The secretary of state for the Home Department controls the administration of the acts, appoints the inspectors referred to in the acts, assigns to them their duties, and regulates the manner and cases in which they are to exercise the powers of inspectors. The act, however, expressly assigns certain duties and powers to a chief inspector and certain to district inspectors. Many provisions of the acts depend as to their operation on the making of orders by the secretary of state. These orders may impose special obligations on occupiers and increase the stringency of regulations, may apply exceptions as to employment, and may modify or relax regulations to meet special classes of circumstances. In certain cases, already indicated, his orders guide or determine the action of district councils, and, generally, in case of default by a council he may empower his inspectors to act as regards workplaces, instead of the council, both under the Factory Acts and Public Health Acts.

The powers of an inspector are to enter, inspect and examine, by day or by night, at any reasonable time, any factory or workshop (or laundry, dock, &c.), or part of one, when he has reason to believe that any person is employed there; to take with him a constable if he has reasonable cause to expect obstruction; to require production of registers, certificates, &c., under the acts; to examine, alone or in the presence of any other person, as he sees fit, every person in the factory or workshop, or in a school where the children employed are being educated; to prosecute, conduct or defend before a court of summary jurisdiction any proceeding under the acts; and to exercise such other powers as are necessary for carrying the act into effect. The inspector has also the duty of enforcing the Truck Acts in places, and in respect of persons, under the Factory Acts. Certifying surgeons are appointed by the chief inspector subject to the regulations of the secretary of state, and their chief duties are (a) to examine workers under sixteen, and persons under special rules, as to physical fitness for the daily work during legal periods, with power to grant qualified certificates as to the work for which the young worker is fit, and (b) to investigate and report on accidents and cases of lead, phosphorus or other poisoning and anthrax.

In 1907 there were registered as under inspection 110,276 factories, including laundries with power, 146,917 workshops (other than men’s workshops), including laundries without power; of works under special rules or regulations (included in the figures just given) there were 10,586 and 19,687 non-textile works under orders for supply of particulars to piece-workers. Of notices of accidents received there were 124,325, of which 1179 were fatal; of reported cases of poisoning there were 653, of which 40 were fatal. Prosecutions were taken by inspectors in 4474 cases and convictions obtained in 4211 cases. Of persons employed there were, according to returns of occupiers, 1904, 4,165,791 in factories and 688,756 in workshops.

Coal Mines.—The mode of progress to be recorded in the regulation of coal mines since 1872 can be contrasted in one aspect with the progress just recorded of factory legislation since 1878. Consolidation was again earlier adopted when large amendments were found necessary, with the result that by far the greater part of the law is to be found in the act of 1887, which repealed and re-enacted, with amendments, the Coal Mines Acts of 1872 and 1886, and the Stratified Ironstone Mines (Gunpowder) Act, 1881. The act of 1881 was simply concerned with rules relating to the use of explosives underground. The act of 1886 dealt with three questions: (a) The election and payment of checkweighers (i.e. the persons appointed and paid by miners in pursuance of section 13 of the act of 1887 for the purpose of taking a correct account on their behalf of the weight of the mineral gotten by them, and for the correct determination of certain deductions for which they may be liable); (b) provision for new powers of the secretary of state to direct a formal investigation of any explosion or accident, and its causes and circumstances, a provision which was later adopted in the law relating to factories; (c) provision enabling any relatives of persons whose death may have been caused by explosions or accidents in or about mines to attend in person, or by agent, coroners’ inquests thereon, and to examine witnesses. The act of 1887, which amended, strengthened and consolidated these acts and the earlier Consolidating Act of 1872, may also be contrasted in another aspect with the general acts of factory legislation. In scope it formed, as its principal forerunner had done, a general code; and in some measure it went farther in the way of consolidation than the Factory Acts had done, inasmuch as certain questions, which in factories are dealt with