In other parts of his report Mr. Jackson has endeavoured to follow the history of boys who have begun life as errand-boys or as van-boys. “From the forms returned,” he writes, “it seems clear that the theory that boys can become errand-boys for a year or two, and then enter skilled trades, cannot be maintained. Very few boys can pick up skill after a year or two of merely errand-boy work.”[143] Or again: “The chart prepared from the forms filled in by boys who entered life as errand-boys shows the small proportion who find any steady and skilled employment afterwards, and those have ceased to be errand-boys very early. The vast majority become workers in low-skilled trades or general and casual labourers.”[144] Of all the “blind-alley” occupations, that of the van-boy appears the most deplorable. “The life of the van-boy is a rough and somewhat lazy one. They have long hours, spells of idleness, and considerable opportunities of pilfering and drinking.”[145] “The chart shows that it is a very low grade of occupation, and that very few boys who begin as van-boys get into skilled trades—a far lower percentage, in fact, than errand-boys.”[146]

The second point to be noted in the table founded on the census returns is the large number—nearly 40 per cent.—of boys of the age of fourteen returned as without specified occupation or unoccupied (including boys at school). There are in the elementary schools about 5,000 boys between the age of fourteen and fifteen, and probably about the same number in secondary schools. Converted into percentages, this 40 per cent. would be broken up into 24 per cent. at school and 16 per cent. without specified occupation. The last figure is high, and justifies the conclusion, not only that the boys of fourteen wander from occupation to occupation, but that they also are frequently doing nothing. The habit of shifting from situation to situation necessarily involves considerable periods of unemployment. Thus early in their career the boys become accustomed to the evils of casual labour.

We can arrive at the same conclusion by approaching the problem from a somewhat different point of view. If in some trades we discover an excess of boys, and in others an excess of men, it is clear that there must be shocks and shiftings in the passage from youth to manhood. In London the number of lads between the ages of fourteen and twenty is 17·5 per cent. of the number of males between the ages of fourteen and sixty-five. If, therefore, we find the proportion of lads to total males engaged in any trade, reckoned in percentages, differs much from 17·5, either lads must at some time pass out of the trade or men come in. On the other hand, in a trade where this percentage is approximately 17·5 boys who enter have, at any rate, the chance of finding employment as men. In this sense we may regard the distribution of lads and men in a trade as normal when this percentage lies between 15 and 20; less than normal when it drops below 15; more than normal when it rises above 20. The following table may be taken as an example of trades in which considerable numbers of persons are engaged:

Trade.Number in
1,000 of Males
Aged 14-20.		Number in
1,000 of Males
Aged 14-65.		Number in
Percentage.
Less than Normal:
Building trades13·2144·29·1
Skin, leather, etc.2·68·514·1
Food, tobacco, drink, and lodging19·9135·214·8
General labour15·0111·113·5
General or local government6·545·814·3
Professional4·862·27·8
Normal:
Domestic services7·851·715·1
Commercial occupations25·9131·119·8
Metals, machines, etc.14·492·715·5
Precious metals6·636·518·2
Furniture, etc.9·359·515·7
Textile fabrics4·123·517·3
More than Normal:
National Government (messengers, etc.)3·913·529·2
Clerks, office-boys, etc.23·183·027·8
Transport, errand-boys, etc.52·3236·322·1
Printers7·134·120·7

If we could have taken the period fourteen to eighteen instead of fourteen to twenty, these tables would have been even more striking than they are. But, even as they are, they are sufficient to enforce the lesson that between the occupation of the boy and the occupation of the man there is a gulf fixed. The one does not lead naturally to the other. When the boy becomes a man he does not find provided for him a natural opening; with more or less pains, he is driven to force a way in trades for which he has received no definite preparation, and in which diligence and good character do not afford any guarantee of success.

(d) Summary.

Before proceeding to examine the conditions of boy labour in other parts of the country, it will be desirable to summarize the results for London, and so to determine how far the essentials of a true apprenticeship system are found in that city.

Supervision.—The boy should be under adequate supervision until he reaches the age of at least eighteen. In London, so far as the majority are concerned, all State supervision ends at fourteen. When the boy goes out to work what measure of supervision was previously found in the home comes to an end; it is beyond the power of parents to exert any real control over the boy. He is his own master, finds his employment for himself, and leaves it when he thinks fit. Philanthropic enterprise touches a fringe, and a fringe only, of the boys; their growing sense of independence resents restraint. The story of the workshop points the same moral. Personal relations between boy and employer are seldom possible; and where the demand for the services of boys is unlimited and unsatisfied, attempts to enforce discipline fail, because, sooner than submit, the boy seeks another situation.

Training.—For the unskilled labourer of the future London provides no training. The schools do, indeed, turn out in the boys ready made and completely finished articles for boy-work and “blind-alley” occupations, and three or four years of such employment destroy the most-marked results of elementary education. The skilled workman of the future finds in the workshop small chance of gaining that all-round training which will make of him a man, and not a machine. Technical education for the minority is successful, but without power to compel attendance and limit the hours of boy-labour it is only the few who can avail themselves of the opportunities offered.

Opening.—Boys’ work is separated from man’s work, and there is no broad highway leading from the one to the other. The lad of eighteen is compelled to make a new beginning just when new beginnings are most difficult. His power of learning is gone from him, and in the unskilled labour market alone does he see any prospect of earning immediate wages. The State Labour Exchange is an infant which has yet to justify its creation.