§ MR. A. C. MORTONI beg to ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department whether he is aware that the Workshops and Factory Acts sanction the employment of young girls, 16 years of age and upwards, in envelope manufactories for 12 hours every day of the week (excepting Saturday), and for two hours additional as overtime (making 14 hours a-day) on 48 days in every 12 months; and whether he will be prepared to favourably consider any proposal for modifying the Code regulating the hours of labour in such manufactories that may be brought forward especially as to abolishing overtime where long hours are already worked?
§ THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOB THE HOME DEPARTMENT (Mr. ASQUITH, Fife, E.)By the 53rd section and 3rd Schedule, Part 3, of the Factory Act, 1878, not only girls above 16 years of age, but all young persons can work two hours' overtime with an extra half-hour for meals for five days in the week on not more than 48 days in the year, not only in envelope making, but in dressmaking, letter-press printing, bookbinding, and sundry other trades. I hope in an amending Bill to reduce the number 1145 of days per week on which overtime can be worked.