MR. J. H. WILSONTo ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department whether his attention has been directed to a complaint made by Mr. George H. Lock, that numbers of men are being paid their wages every Saturday at the Rising Sun Hotel, Cardiff; whether he is aware that the proprietor of the hotel pays the wages for a stevedore of Cardiff; and, seeing that the payment of workmen's wages in a public-house is a broach of the Truck Act, whether he can say what action he will take in the matter, with a view of preventing workmen's wages being paid in public-houses in future.
(Answered by Mr. Secretary Gladstone.) I have called for a report from the Cardiff police on the subject, and am informed that the proprietor of the public-house has been seen and admits that certain men, who were in the habit of frequenting the house, have received their wages there for some time past. It appears, however, from the police report that they were paid by their ganger, and not by the proprietor as stated in the question. The proprietor states that he offered no inducement for the men to be paid at this house, and since his attention was called to the matter at the beginning of last month the practice appears to have ceased. The practice clearly involved a breach of the Payment of Wages in Public-Houses Prohibition Act, 1883. This Act, however, is enforced, not by the Home Office, but by the police, who report that no complaint has been received by them with regard to the matter, but that special attention will be given to the premises in question to prevent any repetition of the offence.