Page:EB1922 - Volume 31.djvu/733

Rh committees consist of representatives, not exceeding 10 in number, of the owners and management of the mine and the workers env ployed in or about the mine, selected by ballot. The functions of a pit committee are to discuss and make recommendations with re- spect to (a) the safety, health and welfare of the workers in connexion with their work in the mine; (b) the maintenance and increase of out- put; (c) reports made on an inspection under section 16 of the Coal Mines Act, 1911, which reports shall be referred to the committee by the manager; (d) disputes arising in connexion with the mine, includ- ing disputes as to wages; and (e) any other questions and matters relative to the mine which may be prescribed by the regulations to be drawn up by the Board of Trade. Any matters which cannot be satisfactorily disposed of by a pit committee are to be referred to the appropriate district committee, or, in the case of questions to which the Coal Mines Act (1911) applies, to the inspector of the division. To enable a pit committee to exercise its functions on the ' first two points indicated above, it is required that the committee should be furnished by the manager of the mine with such relevant information as may be necessary for its purpose and may appoint members to make periodical inspections of the mine.

The district committees and the area boards, which likewise consist of representatives of the owners and the management and an equal number of representatives of the workers, consider ques- tions of a similar nature; a district committee is also required to consider any matter referred to them by a pit committee or by the area board or the Board of Trade, and the area board is required to consider any questions which may be referred to it by a district committee or by the national board or the Board of Trade. An area board is in addition required to formulate, at such intervals and on such principles as may be prescribed by the national board, schemes for adjusting the remuneration of the workers within the area; the Board of Trade may by regulation provide for district committees or area boards determining any question and exercising any powers which, before the passing of this Act, were determined or exercised by a conciliation board or by a joint district board constituted under the Coal Mines (Minimum Wage) Act, 1912.

The national board, which is equally representative of owners and workpeople, is required to take into consideration questions, in- cluding wages questions, affecting the coal-mining industry as a whole, any questions which may be referred to them by an area board, and any questions which may be referred to them by the Board of Trade. The national board is also to determine, subject to the approval of the Board of Trade, the principles on which schemes by area boards for adjusting the remuneration of workers are to be framed. Where any recommendation made by a district committee or area board or by the national board, or any scheme made by an area board and approved by the national board, has been forwarded or referred to the Board of Trade, the Board of Trade may give directions requiring any person engaged in the coal-mining industry to comply therewith.

A further provision of the Act requires the constitution of a fund to be applied to such purposes connected with the social well-being, recreation and conditions of living of .workers in or about coal- mines, and with mining education and research, as the Board of Trade, after consultation with any Government department con- cerned, may approve; and the owners of every coal-mine are re- quired for a period of six years to pay a sum equal to id. a ton of the output of the mine for the creation of such a fund.

Shops. Further legislation has been enacted in regard to employment in shops. The Shops Regulation Acts, 1892-1911, were consolidated by the Shops Act, 1912, which contains various provisions for protecting shop assistants.

The Act requires inter alia that, on at least one weekday in each week, a shop assistant may not be employed about the business of the shop after 1 :3O P.M. ; it contains requirements as to intervals for meals, and further requires that no person under the age of 1 8 years is to be employed in or about a shop for a longer period than 74 hours (including meal times) in any one week. Besides these pro- visions, the Act contains provisions under which every shop, save for exceptions allowed by the Act, must be closed for the serving of customers not later than I P.M. on one weekday in every week; closing orders may also be made fixing the hours on the several days of the week at which, either throughout the area of a local authority or in any specified part thereof, all shops or shops of any specified class are to be closed for the serving of customers, but the hours fixed by the closing order may not be earlier than 7 P.M. on any day.

The Shops Act, 1913, amended the Act of 1912 in its applica- tion to premises for the sale of refreshments. The Shops (Early Closing) Act, 1920, continues Regulation 10 B. of the Defence of the Realm Regulations, as amended, and requires that, subject to certain specified exceptions, every shop shall be closed for the serving of customers not later than 8 o'clock in the evening on every day other than Saturday and not later than 9 o'clock in the evening on Saturday.

Minimum Wage. One of the most important developments of labour legislation in recent years has been minimum-wage legislation. Minimum-wage boards had been in existence for some time in Australasia before they were tentatively introduced into the United Kingdom by the Trade Boards Act, 1909, followed by the Trade Boards Act, 1918 (see TRADE BOARDS). The latter empowers the Minister of Labour to extend by Special Order the provisions of the Trade Boards Act, 1909, to other trades, and under its provision trade boards have now been set up in a large number of trades. The Corn Production Act, 1917, extended similar legislation to agriculture. A rather different kind of minimum-wage legislation was that embodied in the Coal Mines (Minimum Wage) Act, 1912, which was passed to terminate a general strike of coal-miners in respect of their claims for " individual district minimum rates." The method of administration of the Act is different from that of the Trade Boards Acts: no inspectorate was appointed, the payment of the minimum rate being part of the workman's contract of service and enforceable in an ordinary court of law.

The Munitions of War Acts, 1915-7, contained provisions which enabled minimum rates of wages to be fixed. These were repealed, however, by the Wages (Temporary Regulation) Act, 1918, the purpose of which was to secure that the standard district rates existing at the date of the Armistice should be continued during the transition period when industry was chang- ing from war to peace conditions. It was extended to Nov. 21 1919 by the Wages (Temporary Regulation) Extension Act, 1919, and the principle of the Acts was continued up to Sept. 30 1920 by the Industrial Courts Act, 1920. In connexion with this subject it should be recorded that the Industrial Conference of 1919 recommended the enforcement by legal enactment of minimum time rates of wages to be of universal applicability.

Old Age and Sickness. For an account of the recent consid- erable developments in the United Kingdom in connexion with unemployment insurance, see UNEMPLOYMENT. Legislation of widespread social importance has been undertaken in a series of measures designed to relieve distress arising from old age or sickness. The Old Age Pensions Act, 1908, under which, subject to certain conditions as to means of support, etc., a pension at the rate of 55. per week became payable to persons who had attained the age of 70, was preliminary to the National Health Insurance Act of 1911, which instituted, with certain specified exceptions, a universal scheme of compulsory insurance against sickness. Contributions are payable by the insured person and by the employer, and, in return the insured person receives certain benefits. These benefits in the main are:

(1) Sickness benefit, i.e. a periodical money payment to the insured! person while rendered incapable of work by some specified disease, either bodily or mental ;

(2) Disablement benefit, i.e. a periodical payment after the right to sickness benefit has been exhausted, and continuing so long as the incapacity continues;

(3) Maternity benefit, being a lump-sum payment in the case of the confinement of an insured woman, or the wife or widow of an insured man;

(4) Medical benefit, being medical treatment and attendance and the provision of medicine and of prescribed medical and surgical appliances; and

(5) Sanatorium benefit, being the treatment of persons suffering from tuberculosis or any other disease specified by the Ministry of

Health.

Sickness and disablement benefits cease when the insured per- son reaches the age of seventy. The Act is administered largely through approved societies, these being principally friendly socie- ties, trade unions, and industrial insurance societies. ,

The Old Age Pensions Act was amended in certain respects in 1911 and the National Insurance Act in 1913, 1914, 1915, 1917, and 1918. As a result of the war, certain other amendments became necessary in order to bring the rates of money contri- butions and benefits into closer relationship with the lessened value of money and the higher cost of living. During the latter part of the war, additional allowances were paid in view of the increased cost of living: the Old Age Pensions Act, 1919, in- creased the weekly sum to ic*. per week and made various other amendments to earlier Acts.

It may also be noted that the Blind Persons Act, 1920, provides