The Ministry of Munitions established the policy of aiding the opening of day nurseries for the children of women munition workers. In 1916 the Ministry decided to make special grants to such institutions to the amount of 75 per cent of the cost of initial equipment and 7d. (14 cents) for each child daily. The Board of Education was to be responsible for the supervision of the nurseries, thirty-one of which had been opened up to April, 1918. The majority were open by night as well as by day. This entire movement was severely criticised by certain groups. “I have said nothing of the risk of planting crèches near explosive work nor of risks to the babies’ health in carrying them on crowded trains at nightfall or dawn,” said Dr. Marion Phillips, a well known representative of labor. “This whole method means a very forcible breaking up of the family life of the community.” In France many crèches for the children of working mothers were established, but in England the movement was not popular and gained but little headway.
Whatever may be the verdict concerning the desirability of the various welfare measures outside the factory as a permanent policy, the greater appreciation of the need of good working conditions within the shop, and the actual improvements made, are noteworthy progressive steps in the history of British working women during the war.
CHAPTER XIII
Effects of the War on the
Employment of Children
In addition to the great increase in the number of employed adult women, war conditions led also to a large growth in the number of employed young boys and girls. The demands of industry, economic necessity and patriotic motives undoubtedly all played a part in the movement. During the unemployment crisis of the autumn of 1914 it was, for a few months, difficult to find places for young workers. In the month ending September 11, 1914, 22,000 boys and 23,000 girls registered at the employment exchanges as against 14,500 boys and 12,700 girls in the corresponding month of 1913. The problem was serious enough in London to cause the establishment of recreation clubs, workrooms and classes for unemployed boys and girls. Children who had recently left school were urged to return.
But on account of the acute need for labor as more and more men were taken into military service, a strong demand for boys and girls at rising wages soon succeeded the depression. By December, 1914, the number of boys registering at the employment exchanges was lower than before the war, and in the first six months of 1915 there were more vacancies than applicants. The increase in the employment of boys was not as steady as that of women, however. Coincident with the spread of substitution by women from 1917 on, the rate of increase fell off, especially in the metal trades, where there was an actual decline of 9,000 between April and October, 1917. The check to employment was so serious as to come to the attention of the Ministry of Munitions, which asked dilution officers to bring to the attention of the Juvenile Employment Committees cases where considerable numbers of boys were to be discharged. Beginning with October, 1917, the Royal Air Force relieved the situation to some extent by using boys from fifteen to eighteen years of age as mechanics, hiring about 5,000 up to April, 1918.
On the whole juvenile employment increased during the war. As was the case with many married women, the rising cost of living and the inadequate separation allowances received by soldiers’ families frequently made it imperative for boys and girls to seek gainful occupation at the earliest possible opportunity. Notably on munitions work patriotic motives proved a strong incentive to attract many young people. Moreover, the natural desire of not a few children to be through with school restraints and to enter adult life was reinforced by the excitement of war time and by the taking over of numerous school buildings for military purposes.
The only set of statistics covering the increase in juvenile workers, comparable with the quarterly reports on the increase in the employment of women, was published by the Ministry of Reconstruction’s committee on “Juvenile Employment during the War and After” and compared October, 1917, and January, 1918, with conditions in July, 1914.[218] It showed that between July, 1914, and January, 1918, in the various occupations outside domestic service the number of working boys and girls under eighteen had risen from 1,936,000 to 2,278,000, or 17.6 per cent. The number of boys increased by 94,000, or 7.4 per cent, and of girls 248,000, or 36.6 per cent, the greater increase in the number of girls being ascribed to the large numbers who turned from domestic service or home duties to the munition factory. It is interesting to note that in contrast to the steady increase in the number of women workers throughout the war, the total number of working boys and girls declined by 9,000 between October, 1917, and January, 1918.
Analyzing the movement of boys and girls between various occupations, among the various kinds of manufacturing by far the largest increase for both sexes was found in the metal trades, that is to say, munitions. Ten thousand boys were employed in Woolwich Arsenal alone before the end of the war. The number of boys in the building trades, wood trades and miscellaneous trades decreased, as well as the number of both sexes in the nonwar industries of textiles, clothing and paper and printing. The increase over the whole group of “industries,” was not, especially with girls, as large as in nonindustrial occupations. In the latter, boys moved away from “finance and commerce,” “agriculture” and “postoffice” into “transport” and “government establishment,” while the increase in the number of girls, though occurring in every occupation, was especially large in “finance and commerce.”
Unfortunately the statistics fail to separate the three classes of juvenile employment which should be considered. These are employment which would have been permitted previous to the war, that involving the relaxation of child labor and compulsory education laws and that which remained entirely illegal. In all three classes, the war apparently produced an increase in numbers.
With regard to the first class, boys and girls legally entitled to work under ordinary circumstances, the British Board of Education estimated that in 1915 the number of children leaving the elementary schools at the age of fourteen or thereabouts was increased by about 10 per cent, or 45,000. For 1916, Mrs. Sidney Webb put the increase in the number leaving in this way at 50,000 to 60,000.[219] On the other hand, Mr. Herbert Fisher, president of the Board of Education, stated in the House of Commons in April, 1917, that, with the greater prosperity of the working classes since the war, the enrolment in secondary schools had increased.[220]