ADMINISTRATION, PENALTIES, AND LEGAL PROCEEDINGS. (Hansard, 25 February 1878)

DR. CAMERON
drew attention to the necessity of having offices in all large towns at which the sub-Inspectors of factories in the district could be found. In Glasgow the greatest difficulty had been experienced from the absence of any such address. He was told by the Glasgow School Board that in connection with the Education Act they wanted to find out the sub-Inspector of factories in the district, and they actually had to write to London for the address. On looking over, The Glasgow Directory, he found there was no address given of 343 the sub-Inspector of factories; and the same he found to be the case in the Directories of Liverpool and Manchester. The reason of this was very obvious. The sub-Inspectors were not very largely paid, and they were obliged to live at addresses which they did not care to parade before the public. In some cases, indeed, it was their custom to have their letters addressed to the Post Office. This ought not to be so, and therefore he would propose that words should be here inserted, which, in connection with a subsequent clause he would propose, should enact that in the chief town of each district, or in such other towns as the Secretary of State might direct, an office should be established, and a register of the factories and workshops within the district kept, which should be open to the inspection of the public at all reasonable hours. It might be objected that this would entail some additional expense, but the expense need not be very great. There were only 50 sub-Inspectors throughout the country, and, therefore, it would not cost much to provide office accommodation for the whole of them. If this were not done, however, the Home Secretary ought to insist upon offices being provided in the large towns, say of more than 25,000 and 50,000 inhabitants. He concluded by moving, in page 31, line 10, after "London," to insert "and sub-Inspectors with offices as hereinafter provided."

MR. ASSHETON CROSS
said, to provide offices for all the Inspectors would be a very great expense, and a greater expense than he thought it was necessary to incur. He found, however, on inquiry, that he could do a great deal to meet the views of the hon. Member in another way, and he would take care that the names and addresses of the Inspectors in the whole of the towns should be fully known, and due notice given of any change. He could not, however, consent to ask the Treasury to go to the expense which would necessarily be involved in providing offices for all the Inspectors.

§ MR. HOPWOOD
moved, in page 31, line 42, after "thereof," to insert "not being a private dwelling-house or room." 344 He wanted to call the attention of the Committee to the extraordinary powers placed in the hands of the Inspector under this Bill; because it was a style of legislation which he hoped they might check before it grew to an excessive indulgence, affecting, as it did, the rights of any man in his own house. He found that power was to be given to enter any factory or workshop at any period of the day or night. Now, the workshop might be a dwelling-house, and he wanted to prevent any such power being given in that case. A man in his own house ought not to be left at the mercy of the judgment of a public officer to enter it when he pleased. He also found it proposed that the Inspector might bring with him a certifying surgeon and a constable to assist him. He admitted this last proposal was about to be softened by an Amendment, to be proposed by the Home Secretary; though, as regarded the first matter to which he had referred, he should feel it his duty to test the opinion of the Committee.

MR. ASSHETON CROSS
was sorry the hon. and learned Member had not placed his Amendment on the Paper, and he was also sorry that he had not quite mastered the effect of the Amendment of which he had himself given Notice. The Amendment which he had placed on the Paper was to strike out all the words in the paragraph from "him" to "and" in line 7, and to insert— In either case a constable into a factory in which he has reasonable cause to apprehend any serious obstruction in the execution of his duty. So that would remove the constable altogether, except so far as a factory was concerned, and everything about a private dwelling-house had been excepted in an earlier part of the Bill, unless the dwelling-house was a workshop, and as regarded that, he proposed hereafter to move the following new clause:— The exercise in a private house or private room by the family dwelling therein, or by any of them, of manual labour by way of trade, or for purposes of gain, in or incidental to any of 345 the handicrafts as specified in the Fifth Schedule of this Act, shall not of itself constitute such house or room a workshop within the meaning of this Act. He hoped, with this explanation, the Amendment would not be pressed.

MR. O'CONNOR POWER
did not think the statement of the Home Secretary set aside the argument of the hon. and learned Member (Mr. Hopwood) in favour of his Amendment. As he understood the hon. and learned Gentleman, he was as anxious to exclude the Inspector from the private dwelling-house as he was to exclude the constable, because he looked upon the power proposed to be given to the Inspector as a dangerous power; and it was no answer to that for the Home Secretary to say he had saved the private dwelling from the dangers of the policeman.

MR. ASSHETON CROSS
said, the hon. Member had not read the Amendment he had placed upon the Paper.

MR. O'CONNOR POWER
had heard the Home Secretary's explanation of it.

MR. ASSHETON CROSS
said, where a place was really and truly a private dwelling-house, then even the Inspector could not go into it.

§ MR. PARNELL
did not think the new clause would contradict what was enacted in Clause 16.

§ MR. WHITBREAD
was as anxious as the hon. and learned Member (Mr. Hopwood) was to exempt a private house from the operation of the Bill, where the private house was really the house of the family; and, as he understood the Amendment of the Home Secretary, the law would be this—where none but the members of the family laboured, then the private house would be exempt; but if, under the guise of a dwelling-house, people carried on work, at which other than the members of the family were employed, then surely it was reasonable the Inspector should have admission.

§ MR. HOPWOOD
complained of the summary manner in which the Home Secretary had treated his Amendment; but he should not be deterred from doing his duty either by the indifference of the right hon. Gentleman or the laughter and jeers of his supporters. He contended that when the Home Secretary disposed of him in the summary way he did, he had no just right to do so. In the favourite new clause of the right hon. Gentleman, the 346 words occurred "where the labour is exercised at irregular intervals." Now, who was to decide what irregular intervals were. It appeared to him that a poor family might one week carry on one class of sewing work, and be subjected to the visit of the Inspector; while another week, if they carried on a different class of sewing work, they might not be subjected to a visit. He hoped, therefore, the Home Secretary would attend a little more to the suggestions coming from the Opposition side of the House.

MR. GORST
said, hon. Gentlemen sitting on his side of the House were quite as anxious as those sitting opposite to see that justice was done in this matter; but, as the clause now stood, an Inspector could not enter a house at all, except it was a workshop, and it must be a real workshop. If he made a mistake, and entered a bonâ fide dwelling-house, then he would be a trespasser, and he would be liable to the penalties of a trespasser. Even if it were a workshop, he might only enter it if he had reasonable cause to believe there was some person being improperly employed there. There, again, if he made a mistake, he could be treated as a trespasser. He asked any hon. Gentleman if it was possible to carry out this Bill with less powers than those asked for by the Home Secretary.

§ SIR SYDNEY WATERLOW
sympathized with the object of the hon. and learned Member (Mr. Hopwood), but thought it would be better attained by waiting until they came to discuss the new clause of the Home Secretary. They had yet to decide what was really to be a workshop. He therefore asked the hon. and learned Member to withdraw his Amendment for the present.

MR. O'CONNOR POWER
believed, from the discussion which had taken place, the Home Secretary would perhaps see the necessity of drawing up a special clause, which might be inserted afterwards on Report. He made this suggestion for this reason. The new clause, to which the right hon. Gentleman had directed attention, had been framed not for the protection and security of the character of the private dwelling-house, but its object was for the exemption of certain trades. The clause itself was headed "Exemption of Certain Trades." If the object of 347 the clause was to obtain protection for the private dwelling-house, why was it not so stated? Let the right hon. Gentleman undertake to bring in a special clause later on, for the purpose of preserving the private part of any house which it might be the duty of an Inspector to visit. He could perform his duty by going through the workshop, and he need not have the liberty which was implied of going into the private parts of the house.

MR. ASSHETON CROSS
said, he could assure hon. Gentlemen he was just as anxious as they were to preserve the private character of the house; and he had already stated, that so far as the constable was concerned, he had disapproved. As far as the Inspector was concerned, hon. Members must remember the great hardships which were inflicted before the Factory and Workshops Acts came into existence. There were a great many trades which were practically carried on by the family, and where the children were the feeders supplying the father and mother with the necessaries—where these things were so carried on, they were to all intents and purposes workshops, and ought so to be treated; but, on the other hand, where the home was carried on as an ordinary home, although the children might be employed in earning money, there nothing would induce him to sanction the principle of applying inspection in such a case.

§ MR. HIBBERT
thought some special provision ought to be made for the visits of the Inspectors to these domestic workshops. That, he thought, would meet the difficulty.

§ MR. HERMON
had come to the conclusion, that he had never heard a debate where the interests of the employers of labour had been so sedulously cared for. Hon. Members opposite seemed to have mistaken the scope of this Bill. It was introduced for the benefit of those who were employed, and not for the benefit of the employer. Hon. Members seemed to think this Bill had been introduced entirely for the benefit of millowners—["No!"]—he knew the Bill had not that object, but hon. Members had been arguing very much as if it had. The Bill was to prevent overwork, and to see that the people had proper times for their meals, and for other purposes; and he protested against 348 the view of the measure taken by hon. Gentlemen opposite.

§ MR. FAWCETT
observed, that they had been told that the intention of the clause was to prevent women being overworked, and that was a very good intention. He did not want to have them over-worked; but he also wanted to protect them against being under-paid. With regard to the Amendment of his hon. and learned Friend, he had listened carefully to the Home Secretary; and he did not seem to him to have answered the objections of the hon. and learned Member for Stockport. According to the Bill, an Inspector would have a right to enter at any time a home in which father, mother, and children might be carrying on an honest industry. They were told that the Inspectors could not enter without having a reasonable excuse for so doing; but they could not leave the homes of England to such a risk as they would thus incur, since the reasonable excuse was to be left to the Inspector's own interpretation. He agreed with the hon. Member for Oldham (Mr. Hibbert), therefore, that they required some new clause. They knew that light industries were to be exempted. Their case had been well argued; but they now wanted additional securities against the intrusion of the Inspector, and unless they received from the Home Secretary some concession in accordance with the views of the hon. Member for Oldham, he hoped the Committee would be divided upon the question.

§ SIR GEORGE CAMPBELL
thought the Amendment of the hon. Member for Maidstone (Sir Sydney Waterlow) would meet all objections. He understood the Home Secretary to say he did not accept it, but he was not quite sure that that was his meaning; and he, therefore, wished him to make clear to the Committee whether he did refuse to accept the Amendment.

MR. ASSHETON CROSS
said, he did not think it fair that he should be pressed at that point to state his view of the matter under discussion. What he had insisted on was, that where there was a bonâ fide reason for believing that children and young persons were being badly treated, it was necessary that the Inspector should have power to interfere to prevent it. In his opinion, they were not gaining time by that discussion, and it would be better to wait until 349 they came to his new clauses. He would only add that the Bill in this respect contained nothing new. What it proposed had, in fact, been in practice for some years.

§ SIR HENRY JACKSON
considered that the matter was one rather of phraseology and drafting. They were all agreed that homes were to be free from the Inspector's visits under all but exceptional circumstances. He thought, however, there was some ambiguity in the wording of the clause; because the clause as drawn suggested that though a perfectly legitimate industry might be carried on in a house, yet, if that industry were coupled with something else which was left undefined, the practical effect would be to turn that house into a workshop.

§ MR. MUNDELLA
said, the Committee must have regard for the welfare of the children working in these homes. That this was necessary, was proved by what Mrs. Simcox had done for the persons engaged in the shirt trade. Unless this point was kept in view, the trade would drift away into those small sweating-rooms, where no care whatever was taken of them. A great quantity of work in the lace-drawing trade was done in small cottages, where some half-dozen little children worked under an old crone, who held a cane in her hand, and occasionally used it. He hoped the Committee would stand by the clause. He would stand up for the sanctity of homes and the rights of women as much as anyone; but he did not believe in the chivalry that left them at the mercy of careless hands in the places they were speaking of.

§ MR. O'SHAUGHNESSY
said, that if the hon. and learned Member for Stockport (Mr. Hopwood) divided, he should vote against the Amendment, because it would entirely protect these homes from the operation of the Act, which he thought would be highly undesirabele

MR. O'CONNOR POWER
observed, that the matter was too serious a one to be disposed of by the simple mode of treatment applied to it by the hon. Member for Sheffield (Mr. Mundella). The hon. and learned Member for Chatham (Mr. Gorst) told them that if an Inspector entered a house improperly he would lay himself open to an action. They might be told in the same way that if a person was assaulted in the 350 street, he could bring an action against his assailant; but it was impossible to legislate satisfactorily on such a principle. What they wanted was a new clause to give security to those homes.

§ MR. GRAY
said, he did not see that religious and charitable institutions—such as convents—were protected. He did not say that such places should be more protected than others; but under this clause almost every convent would be a factory or a workshop, because washing and various other domestic operations were carried on in them, and also some industrial processes. If the clause passed as it stood, therefore, it would give power to the Inspector to enter every one of those places. In many of those institutions in Ireland, and also in England, industrial employments were carried on—not so much for the sake of gain, however, as to give instruction to the persons who were cared for in them, and whose work was sold. It appeared to him that those establishments would be constituted factories or workshops under the Bill. He should support the Amendment.

§ MR. PARNELL
reminded the Committee that they were legislating for various classes of persons who were not represented in that House, and they should on that very account be especially cautious in the enactments they made. He knew that the new clauses of the Home Secretary struck out the private houses of hon. Members, for example; but they left to the operation of the Bill the houses of those poor persons who were obliged to work in their homes at the various industries by which they gained their livelihood. If the question were put to Members of that House in their own case, they would not give an Inspector power to enter their homes at any hour of the night. The Committee should, therefore, consider well what it was about before it sanctioned that to be done in the case of other people that which it would not tolerate in its own. He would suggest that a new clause should be brought up in the Report, providing that in all cases where an Inspector thought it necessary to search a house, he should first obtain a magistrate's warrant.

§ LORD FREDERICK CAVENDISH
said, it certainly appeared to him that there was no adequate protection afforded for the cases in which it should 351 be given. Before the Committee sanctioned the proposal, he would strongly recommend them to read the Report of the Children's Employment Commission.

§ MR. HOPWOOD
thought it was too much to say that, because there were some individual cases of hardship, therefore there should be a general loss of liberty. By the clause, as it stood, every place was made a workshop in which any person was supposed to be at work. The supporters of the clause said they had a right to urge what they were urging; but the Home Secretary admitted that the objections of his opponents on this point were well founded, and put on the Paper an Amendment to meet it. That Amendment, however, was altogether unsatisfactory, because it established another test, according to which the Inspector was to be guided in the exercise of his discretion, and failed to meet the substantial character of the complaint they made.

§ MR. GRAY
moved to insert the words— Nothing in this clause shall authorize any Inspector to enter any convent, monastery, orphanage, or charitable institution. There were, he said, a number of these institutions which might, by the Bill, be brought under the definition of workshops; and he desired, by his Amendment, to raise specifically and distinctly the question of their exemption from the visits of Inspectors.

§ MR. NEWDEGATE
said, there was a strong feeling amongst a large minority of the House, and a still stronger feeling pervading a vast number of the people of England and Scotland, that conventual and monastic institutions ought, on public grounds, to be inspected—that they ought to be inspected on the same grounds that prevailed in Germany, France, and other foreign countries. There was a proposal now before the Committee to recognize that conclusion, on the supposition that those institutions were used for the purposes of trade. It happened to be within his knowledge that in Belgium, and particularly in the city of Mechlin, the 352 trades carried on in those institutions operated in a most oppressive manner by the competition they brought to bear on ordinary workpeople not connected with them—their endowments being used as against the free labour of the artizans outside. He had never heard that the inmates of these conventual and monastic institutions were better or more leniently treated than the ordinary run of workpeople; on the contrary, he believed that the influence of the "houses" had been to impose upon them labour in a manner condemned by the Factory Acts and by the general law of this country. He hoped, therefore, that the Committee would not entertain the proposal of the hon. Member for Tipperary—the more so for the reason that they had at last an admission that these conventual and monastic institutions were not ordinary private houses, whilst hitherto the argument against their inspection had been that they were private houses. That admission was inconsistent with the general argument which had been used against the introduction into England of a law similar to that in force in Continental countries, and was inconsistent with the scope and intention of the Bill now before the Committee.

MR. O'CONNOR POWER,
as a Catholic Member, was indebted to the hon. Member for Tipperary for bringing forward his Amendment, the object of which had been entirely misapprehended by the hon. Member for North Warwickshire. It was true that the ground upon which the inspection of convents and monasteries had hitherto been opposed was, that they were public institutions; but would the hon. Gentleman be surprised to hear that it was now intended to oppose their inspection on the ground that they were also private houses? The argument by which it was sought to fix them upon the horns of a dilemma existed only in the heated imagination of the hon. Member for North Warwickshire. This was a question, he thought, upon which they might safely appeal to the Secretary of State to say that no case had been made out in any of the Blue Books for dealing with these religious institutions under the Factories and Workshops Act. He hoped the Home Secretary would accept the Amendment, and thus save the Committee from the discussion of a very delicate question which the hon. Mem- 353 ber for North"Warwickshire would be only too glad to raise.

MR. ASSHETON CROSS
pointed out that if these religious institutions—about which he knew nothing—came under the definition of private houses they would be exempt from inspection; if they partook of the character of workshops they would, he presumed, come under the operation of the Act.

§ SIR JOSEPH M'KENNA
said, that it was quite open to hon. Members to argue, on the one hand, that these institutions were industrial places, and on the other, that they were private houses; but they were generally regarded as religious and philanthropic communities formed for the purpose of finding employment for and reclaiming the vicious and the neglected. That being so, the subject was, to his mind, too important to be disposed of in a summary way; and therefore he should move to report Progress.

MR. ASSHETON CROSS
asked if any of the institutions referred to had suffered the slightest hardship or injustice by the operation of the Acts up to the present time. The present Bill left the law precisely the same as before so far as the object of the Amendment was concerned.

§ MR. GRAY
did not regard the remark of the right hon. Gentleman as in any way convincing. The necessity for the present Bill was the discovery that the law in some instances was inoperative; and in common sense it was only fair to assume that if the measure passed it would enforce more stringent regulations. If not, what was the good of discussing the Bill? His contention was that by the Bill institutions which were formerly private houses, would be converted into workshops—that the meaning of the term "workshop" had been strained so as to create an artificial definition within which those institutions might be included. Whatever abuses might exist in ordinary workshops, there were none which would justify the conversion of conventual institutions into factories or workshops for legal purposes. After the remarks of the hon. Member for North Warwickshire—whose state- 354 ments must always be taken cum grano—the rejection of the Amendment would be considered a distinct indignity by the Catholic Members; whilst, also, the Home Secretary must be regarded as endorsing those remarks.

§ MR. NEWDEGATE
explained that what he intended to convey was, that certain influences were exercised and a certain discipline enforced in Mechlin and in other parts of Belgium and the Continent, which did not exist in ordinary private houses. The object of the Amendment was to obtain a special exemption, and to that special exemption he objected.

§ MR. O'DONNELL
was ready to admit that in convents and religious institutions influences were exercised which did not prevail in some private houses; but they were influences for good. The question was one of considerable difficulty, complicated as it was by two points in direct opposition. First, there was the question of the convent with its absolute privacy, and the protection which its semi-sacred character always afforded it in the eyes of Catholics; and then there was the question of the factories or workshops attached to the convent which it might be sought to bring under the operation of the law. It was, however, quite possible that many factories could be conducted under the supervision of nuns and monks; also that many kinds of work could be encouraged by members of monastic and conventual corporations; and yet the inspection of factories and work of that kind might not in any way trench upon the privacy with which a monastery or a convent was conducted. He was sure that no one would recognize more readily than the right hon. Gentleman the Home Secretary the danger that serious misunderstandings might arise if, by hasty legislation, they gave a loophole to zealots on either side to confound proper conventual work, which ought not to be inspected by State officials, with bonâ fide work, which, partaking of the character of factory work, might be all the better for such inspection. It might be considered that the ordinary stitching and sewing of the domestic household was a sort of factory work. It was for the Government to show some way by which those two subjects, which were liable to get entangled one with the other, could be distinctly separated; 355 and, unless the right hon. Gentleman could make that distinction clear to the Committee, he should support the Motion for reporting Progress, though his doing so might give rise to a certain suspicion based upon reminiscences of the past. Perhaps some hon. Member better acquainted with the Forms of the House than he was would be able to indicate how the matter might be fairly brought under consideration on a future day, in order that, on the one hand, the rights of the State to supervise all bonâ fide factory work might be maintained, and, on the other, the rights of conscience protected from unnecessary supervision, which would be an insult on conventual and monastic institutions. If they could not see their way to postpone the consideration of this question, he was afraid they had no alternative but to insist, so far as they could do so Constitutionally, upon carrying on their Motions for Progress, and so forth.

MR. ASSHETON CROSS
said, he could not think of accepting the Amendment for a moment, because it would apply to every charitable institution in the Kingdom. If, however, the hon. Member (Mr. Gray) wished to raise the question, his proper course would be to bring the subject before the Committee in a separate clause. If the hon. Gentleman assented to that suggestion, the Motion for reporting Progress might be withdrawn.

§ MR. O'SHAUGHNESSY
joined in the Motion for reporting Progress, because he agreed that it was absolutely necessary to make some provision for the protection of these institutions. But it seemed to him that, in order to bring private houses under inspection, the business there must be carried on by members of the same family dwelling therein. The Proviso in question enacting that was as follows:— Where persons are employed at homo, that is to say, in a private house, room, or place which, though used as a dwelling, is by reason of the work carried on there a factory or workshop within the meaning of this Act, and in which neither steam, water, nor other mechanical power is used, and in which the only persons employed are members of the same family dwelling there. That evidently had reference to the danger of children being over-worked under the supervision of their parents; and therefore he thought it would apply 356 to industrial schools. The real danger to the institutions in question, if such danger existed, would arise under one of the sub-sections in Clause 88, which defined the class of houses which should be called workshops, and should be subjected to the provisions of the Act—namely,"any premises in which any manual labour was exercised by way of trade or for purposes of gain." These words were very large, and undoubtedly, as he contended, if operations carried on in conventual or monastic institutions, were for the purposes of maintaining those institutions, those would be "purposes of gain."

§ SIR HENRY JACKSON
said, a very important question affecting institutions, which hon. Members on that side of the House wished to protect, had been raised, as it seemed, somewhat accidentally; but he desired to point out that the Amendment of the hon. Member for Tipperary (Mr. Gray) was proposed in rather an awkward place, inasmuch as, if the proposed words were inserted there, they would, by the rules of construction, be excluded everywhere else. His better course would be to allow the present clause to pass, and later on introduce a Proviso to Clause 88—the Definition Clause—whereby he might prevent conventual institutions from being included within the expression "workshop." By adopting that course, the hon. Member would secure for himself and his Friends an opportunity of calmly considering the question in which they took an interest. To introduce the Amendment in the clause under consideration would really do more harm than good. The hon. Member for Youghal (Sir Joseph M'Kenna) might withdraw his Motion for reporting Progress, the hon. Member for Tipperary his Amendment, and the whole question could be raised on the Definition Clause. In the meantime, the right hon. Gentleman the Home Secretary, who no doubt desired to give hon. Members a fair opportunity for discussion, might ascertain from the draftsman the best form in which the Proviso could be prepared.

§ MR. GRAY
complained that he had been unable to elicit from the right hon. Gentleman the Home Secretary, though he had appealed to him two or three times before, any explanation bearing upon the subject. The absence of such 357 explanation led him to raise the question, as he had done, on a definite issue. The Committee had been a long time occupied with the Bill, and he would suggest as the most convenient course, that Progress be now reported, and the subject discussed, if necessary, at some future stage.

MR. ASSHETON CROSS
said, it was quite clear that the Amendment ought to be discussed at a later stage, and not upon this clause. He would be willing to report Progress, as soon as the clause had been agreed to. He hoped, therefore, that both the Amendment and the Motion for Progress would be withdrawn.

§ MR. GRAY
expressed his willingness to withdraw the Amendment and raise the question again, if the hon. Member for Youghal would withdraw his Motion for reporting Progress.

MR. ASSHETON CROSS (for The O'CONOR DON),
moved, in page 32, line 43, at end, to add— Provided always, That no one shall he required under this section to answer any question or to give any evidence tending to criminate himself.

§ MR. E. JENKINS
said, it seemed to him that the insertion of this Amendment would have the effect of neutralizing the preceding clause. He would however, like to have the opinion of the right hon. Gentleman on the point.

MR. ASSHETON CROSS
explained that the Amendment would not carry the law further than the existing provisions.

§ MR. PARNELL
moved, in page 33, line 6, at end of clause, to add— And where an inspector is so ohstructed in a factory or workshop within the meaning of section sixteen of this Act, the occupier shall he liable to a fine not exceeding one, or where the offence is committed at night, five pounds.