§ MR. D. A. THOMAS (Merthyr Tydfil)I beg to ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department if he can afford any explanation of the fact that the death rate from accident of persons of sixteen years of age and under employed in collieries in the South Wales district has latterly increased, and that it was higher in 1900 than in any previous year in the decade; and if his attention has been drawn to the fact that, whereas in each of the five years of 1891 to 1895 inclusive, the death rate was less than that among persons of over sixteen years of age, in each of the years 1896 to 1900 it was higher, and that in the last five years it was forty-five per cent. greater than in the previous five years.
§ *MR. RITCHIEIt is true that there has been a rise in the death rate among persons under sixteen in mines in South Wales, and that for the last five years it is higher than the death rate among persons over sixteen, whereas in the preceding five years it was lower. In the preceding five years, however, the death rate among persons over sixteen was abnormally heavy, and the rate has declined from 3.50 during those years to 2 during the last five years. A large proportion of the accidents to boys occur in connection with haulage underground, and the reasons for the increase in the death rate among them are perhaps to be found in the greater amount of haulage done in the mines now as compared with previous years, the increased use of machinery, and the greater number of boys employed in connection with machinery.