§ MR. RAMSAY MACDONALDI beg to ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, whether his attention has been called to the number of fatal accidents in factories and workshops reported during March last, which show an increase of 20 per cent. on the number reported in March 1907; whether this increase has been going on steadily for some years; and whether he proposes to take any steps to find the causes of the increase with a view to diminishing it.
§ MR. GLADSTONEI am aware of the figures referred to in the Question, which are prepared in my Department, but I do not think that too much importance should be attached to monthly fluctuations. I may point out to the hon. Member that the dock accidents for the same months show a very much larger percentage of decrease. So far as regards fatal accidents in factories and workshops the hon. Member is, I think, under some misapprehension. The number of these accidents has not, as he suggests, been steadily increasing for some years: on the contrary from 1900 to 1904 there was, with the exception of one year, a steady decline, and it was only the figures of last year that have gone back to the level of 1656 1900. I am carefully investigating the whole question of the increase in the number of reported accidents under the Factory Act, and it will be dealt with by the Chief Inspector in the forthcoming annual Report.