Women's Work

by A. A. Brooke; Margaret Whitley

Whilst it may be urged on the one hand that any further intervention on the part of the State must proceed with the utmost caution in view of the extent to which married women are employed, it is impossible to regard with anything but feelings of alarm and even of consternation such statistics on this matter as are already available, and it would seem in the highest degree desirable that either a Select Committee of the House of Commons, or a Departmental Committee representing the Home Office and the Local Government Board, should without delay extend and consolidate the researches which have been made, with a view to furnishing in the most reliable manner data upon which any further enactments may be laid down. That there will have to be a further and considerable extension of the period referred to, and that in certain occupations which are shewn to be peculiarly prejudicial to the health of women the prohibition of their labour may be held to be necessary in the public interest, are facts which no one acquainted with the growth of public sentiment can fail to observe.

(3) Regulation of Hours of Labour. (a) The Abolition of Legalised Overtime. Allusion has already been made to the grievous defect which has gradually crept into and tended largely to destroy the efficiency of the Factory Acts. Evidence given before the Labour Commission, and furnished on many occasions in the annual report of the Chief Inspector of Factories by Her Majesty’s factory inspectors, proves conclusively that in the first place such overtime is injurious; in the second place, that it is often totally unnecessary; and, in the third place, that it is impossible to keep an effective check on the period during which work is performed. The character of that section of the Act which enables overtime to be worked may be judged from the following extract: “Where it is proved to the satisfaction of a Secretary of State that in any class of non-textile factories or workshops or parts thereof, it is necessary by reason of the material which is the subject of the manufacturing process or handicraft therein being liable to be spoiled by the weather, or by reason of press of work arising at certain recurring seasons of the year, or by reason of the liability of the business to a sudden press of orders arising from unforeseen events, to employ young persons and women in manner authorised by this exception, and that such employment will not injure the health of the young persons and women affected thereby, he may, by order made under part of this Act, extend this exception to such factories or workshops, or parts thereof.” Employers are thus permitted to work women and young persons—and a child of thirteen bearing her school certificate ranks as a “young person”—for forty-eight days in any twelve months for fourteen hours a day exclusive of meal times, in flax scutch mills, brick and tile making, parts of rope works carried on in the open air, Turkey-red dyeing and glue making (overtime being permissible in these cases because of considerations of weather), letterpress printing, bookbinding, lithographic printing, Christmas present making, firewood cutting, almanac making, ærated water making, and playing-card making (these trades being licensed because “press of work arises at certain recurring seasons of the year”), the making-up of any article of wearing apparel and furniture hangings, artificial flower making, fancy box making, biscuit making and job dyeing, and the extensive class of workers who are employed in warehouses in polishing, cleaning, wrapping, or packing up goods. The State itself also asks to be exempted from its own laws, and we find that, by an order gazetted September 16, 1889, the milling, perforating, and gumming of postage and inland revenue stamps are made the subject of legalised overtime. But the forty-eight days which are set as the limit in these cases are doubled in respect to that category of trades which deals with perishable articles, so that in processes connected with preserving fruit or fish and the making of condensed milk, women are actually allowed by the law to work for ninety-six days in the course of any twelve months for fourteen hours a day.

The only objections that can be urged to putting factories in general upon the same footing as those in the textile trades are the arguments which were adduced against the principle of State regulation of the hours of labour. If the textile trades can be conducted without overtime—trades which are dominated by changes of fashion and season just as much as any other trades—is it not absurd on the face of it to allow printers, pork-pie makers, and a host of other manufacturers whose business is supposed to be affected by liability to sudden pressure of orders and by season demands to remain untouched by the Act? Granted that excessively long hours are necessary for certain periods in the case of operations that have to be conducted out of doors, or such operations as fish curing and the like, the way to meet the difficulty is not by over-taxing the strength of those employed, but by working double or, if necessary, treble shifts. It cannot be too strongly urged that these exceptions are entirely contrary to the spirit of factory legislation, which is based upon the doctrine that trade must adapt itself to what is necessary for the workers in regard to their health and requirements as human beings, and that it is entirely opposed to the theory that human beings must adapt their standard of health and leisure to the conveniences and exigencies of trade. Whether the maximum hours of labour fixed for the textile trades, viz., fifty-six per week, are not too many is another question. In the opinion of the operatives themselves forty-eight hours are long enough, and the textile trades are promoting a bill to give legislative force to their belief. It has been shewn in previous chapters that the intensity of work has greatly increased, and that the demands made upon the strength and endurance of the workers are probably more severe than was the case before the passing of the Acts. It must not be forgotten that a law which has been made by the national legislature in such a matter as this imposes a responsibility of the very gravest kind upon the nation. In other trades the hours of labour are now, generally speaking, shorter than those in the textile trades. London builders, taking the year round, do not work more than an average of forty-eight hours a week, engineers work fifty-two and a half, and so do boiler-makers and iron-founders. This is not the place for a detailed treatment of the demand for a shorter day, but the fact cannot be overlooked—a fact which was insisted upon in the fifth chapter—that as motive power and machinery replace manual work so the claim for longer periods of rest and leisure grows stronger. There is a danger lest society in its intense pre-occupation with the multiplication of commodities should take up a false position simply by forgetting this fact. But if the arguments in favour of a general reduction of the hours of labour are strong anywhere, they are peculiarly strong in the case of women, for in a vast number of cases a woman, when she leaves her daily work, has to begin a second spell of work at home.

(b) Continuation of Work at Home after Factory Hours.—This is a practice which is openly encouraged by some manufacturers, and more or less secretly by others. It is a common sight, for instance, in Belfast, to see women returning home from the handkerchief or other works in which they have been employed during the whole day, with bundles of work to make up at night, so that the worker has to stitch often till midnight, or later, in order to take the finished bundle back the next morning. In London, too, this practice obtains. Obviously, if such an infringement of the spirit of the Act is allowed, the factory regulation becomes worthless in respect of hours.

(4) The Regulation of Outwork.—By a clause in the Act of 1891 the Home Secretary was empowered to schedule certain trades in which work was given out by a middleman or manufacturer—either to contractors or to workpeople direct—to be done off the premises; to enforce the keeping of a register giving the names and addresses of such persons, so as to enable the factory inspector or the sanitary authority to investigate the conditions under which the work was being done. The Home Secretary has made an order which brings the clothing trades, the cabinet trade, and the electro-plating industry under this provision, and energetic steps have been taken to trace the work thus given out. Obviously, however, such a task involves a large staff of inspectors; and in cases where the duty devolves upon the sanitary authority the expense suddenly thrown upon the ratepayers to provide an adequate staff, added to other considerations, has led to practically nothing being done, so that the order remains inoperative. It is unquestionably desirable that the person who gives out the work should be made responsible for the sanitary and other conditions under which it is performed, a provision which would act as a deterrent to a practice which is admittedly full of hardships for the workers and of risks for the consumers. As to the latter consideration, the whole question of the administration of the workshops part of the Factory Acts by the local authorities will have to be revised. As things are at present, there is no power of compelling them to do the work, whilst the division of authority which exists between the Factory Department and the local sanitary authority is very far from tending to the efficient carrying out of the measures laid down. The great thing is, however, that the principle of throwing the responsibility for the conditions of labour upon the person who practically employs such labour—whether by means of the sweating system or not—should be recognised, and a first step in this direction has undoubtedly been taken by the registration order referred to.

(5) Child Labour.—Both the educational and physiological experts who have given attention to this question are agreed that two things should be done. The system of half-time, under which a child spends half the week in the factory and half in the school, is a double evil to the half-timer, as both education and health suffer from the process. In the opinion of many competent observers the system of half-time should be abolished. So long, however, as it is permitted to continue, the age of eleven which was fixed under the new Act is undoubtedly too low, taking the general level of European nations as a standard, for, after all, the work in school is to the average child as hard as work in the factory, and it is too much to demand of young children the double strain entailed by mental, nervous, and physical causes which is involved in the school and factory régime. The age of thirteen, at which the child passes into the “young person” stage—to use the legal expression—and obtains the privilege of working full time, may be warranted in certain trades, but it is highly desirable that the field of occupation should be differentiated, and that occupations such as the textile trades, which involve special strain upon the physique of growing children, should be regulated by a scale of age.

(6) Extension of the Factory Acts.—The Acts should be extended so as to cover the case of laundresses, who ought never to have been left out. The sanitary conditions under which vast numbers of these women work are extremely bad, the hours of work are excessively long and far above the standard set by the Factory Acts, and in steam laundries there is a quantity of machinery used without any safeguards being adopted for proper fencing, so that accidents are very frequent. The arguments used for keeping laundries outside the Acts are, that it is a more or less domestic industry, that any limitation would fall very severely on the small employer, and that the nature of the trade is such as to necessitate long working hours during the latter part of the week, when most of the work is done. Against this, however, we must set the facts that no attempt has really been made to organize the work, which could as well be spread over a longer period as crowded into a few days each week; that individual employers have successfully done so; that for the protection of the women as well as of the public, sanitary supervision is most essential; and, finally, that the health and safety of those employed are severely compromised by the conditions under which work is done at present.

(7) Co-ordination of Local and Imperial Authority.—Reference has been made to the difficulties which arise in the dual control exercised by the Factory Department and the local sanitary authority, which latter body is responsible for the sanitary conditions of workshops, subject to a final reference to the Factory Department. Experience in past years has proved that when it has been sought in the same way to devolve upon the local authorities these important powers, general neglect has been shown by a large number of districts, so much so indeed, that after a trial it was found necessary for the Factory Department to resume the work of inspection. This portion of the Act has in fact been tossed backwards and forwards with results that can scarcely be called satisfactory. It remains to be seen whether some plan cannot be adopted by which the local authorities can be utilised without the provisions of the Act being allowed to lapse—a plan which should be checked by head-quarters either at the Local Government Board or the Home Office, or by an executive Labour Department of the future, so that a given standard of efficiency may be secured. There remain certain administrative reforms which will no doubt be carried out as time goes on. Already large additions have been made to the existing staff of factory inspectors.[19]

Whilst much of the work is of a more or less routine and simple character, and can be discharged best by those who are acquainted with the technicalities and methods of the trade, there are certain departments which call for the highest scientific skill, for full statistical information, as well as for unceasing vigilance. A word or two must be added as to the penalties which are inflicted under the Acts. The scale suggested by the Acts is very low, and the magistrates often inflict a merely nominal penalty, so that employers who infringe the Acts have little to fear except from the annoyance caused by proceedings being taken against them. This is a thoroughly unsatisfactory state of things.

(8) The Truck Act.—For the protection of women workers an amendment to the Truck Act is sorely needed; the system of arbitrary fines and deductions, to which reference has already been made, is an unmitigated evil, and tends more than any other condition of labour to degrade the workers, and hold them in bondage.