HC Deb 01 November 1920 vol 134 cc100-10

Order for Second Reading read.

The SECRETARY of STATE for the HOME DEPARTMENT (Mr. Shortt)

I beg to move, "That the Bill be now read a Second time."

This is a very short Bill, which is intended to carry out the obligations under which this country rests to the International Labour Organisation of the League of Nations, which met at Washington last November and made certain recommendations. Among the recommendations are those which appear in the Schedule to this Bill and which have to be submitted to Parliament for ratification and inclusion in the legislation of the country. They deal with lead processes. They do not set up a maximum standard. What they recommend is the minimum standard to which every country ought at least to attain. This does not in the least prevent any country, including ourselves, from either continuing to be better than the recommendations, or, if not better now, becoming better than the recommendations. So far as this country is concerned it will make very little difference, because where we differ from the recommendations we are better and we shall remain better; but it is essential that we shall as soon as possible carry out the obligation under which we rest to the labour organisations of the League of Nations to have all these matters laid before Parliament and passed into law. This Bill deals with lead processes and certain limitations which are necessary in those processes which are dangerous, and there are certain provisions for health, etc., which are essential in all lead processes. We have carried out the full recommendations. I do not know of any objection to the Bill. It is entirely non-controversial, and I hope that the House will not only give it a Second Reading, but, as we have plenty of time this after noon, will allow us to take it through all its stages.

Mr. HOGGE

Like every other Member presumably of the House, we all welcome a Bill which seeks to standardise the minimum of industrial conditions all over the world. Nobody on this side of the House will complain for a moment about the introduction of this Bill, but I would like to ascertain exactly what we are asked to do. I gather from what the Home Secretary has said and the preamble to the Bill that this is the first recommendation with which we are dealing of the International Labour organisation of the League of Nations, which met in Washington some months ago.

Mr. SHORTT

One of the first.

Mr. HOGGE

I take it from what the Home Secretary has said that passing this Bill is a work of supererogation, because we have ourselves better legislation with regard to this particular industry than is incorporated in this Bill.

Mr. SHORTT

Nearly so.

Mr. HOGGE

If it is not so, the only advantage in passing the Bill would be to secure conditions more favourable to the industry than those which we have at present. In what respects is it better than any legislation which we have dealing with this particular subject? After all, that is the only point about which we want to concern ourselves. If the bulk of the conditions are less favourable than those we already have, what are the conditions which are not so favourable and are being dealt with in this Bill? What is going to be done with the body of this law when it has passed the House of Commons? I take it that this is part of an international scheme, of an attempt to reap the fruits of the League of Nations and to have a volume of industrial law applicable, as far as possible, to every nation inside the League. These Bills are going through as purely British Acts. I believe that must be necessary for the processes of this House, but what attempt is being made to keep this separate and to see that all the work of the nations inside the League adopt minimum conditions for industry?

Major HILLS

I welcome this Bill very heartily as one who has fought for some time to obviate the evil effects of lead poisoning, and I congratulate the Home Secretary on its introduction. With regard to the speech of the last hon. Member, I think I am right in saying that the position is this: The Bill deals with two things. Clause 1 deals with the use of lead in certain processes only, and is, I think, an improvement upon our legislation. Clause 2 deals with lead in all processes, including lead in pottery work, and is in effect the same system as we have had in operation for many years in this country. I think the hon. Member is under a misapprehension. All the Governments that are represented at the conference of labour organisations under the League of Nations are, I believe, pledged to bring in legislation which will carry out the decisions of that body. This Bill represents one of the decisions reached at Washington. The decision is not carried out by means of identical Acts all over the world, but each Government in its own way is compelled to bring in legislation, and it is for the parliament of each country to pass that legislation or reject it.

Mr. HOGGE

Does the hon. and gallant Member mean by that that a similar standard is to be adopted in each country, or that the standards in the different countries can be dissimilar?

Major HILLS

All Governments are pledged to introduce at least the minimum of which the labour conference approves. At the same time they are expressly excused from reducing their own minimum to meet a general minimum. Progressive countries which possess a more advanced code are not obliged to bring down that code to the general average. When legislation is introduced I take it that Parliament is free to amend it by way of improving it, or to reject it. That is the only way in which you can pass satisfactory legislation. With regard to Clause 2, I believe that all these Regulations have been in force for many years in our pottery works, and certainly the effect of the Regulations in diminishing the evil of lead poisoning has been great. That has been the case especially as it affects women. The effect on women is far worse than on men.

Sir F. BANBURY

Why?

Major HILLS

Because it brings on miscarriages. I am very glad that we are giving a lead in passing this legislation. I hope that we shall soon see the other Bills in regard to which agreement was reached at Washington.

Mr. WIGNALL

I have carefully considered the Bill and, as far as my memory will permit, I have recalled the details of other legislation dealing with the processes in the working of lead. I heartily welcome the Bill because I think it marks an advance on the conditions that prevail now. Especially I welcome the provision in the Schedule that women or girls under eighteen years of age ought not to be employed in any place or factory where lead is in use. I have had some experience of the dreadful ravages of this disease. The many precautions adopted under the Acts that have been passed for preventing lead poisoning have to a considerable degree reduced the terrible effects, but there are still evils existing. Any person knowing anything of the evil consequences of lead working in any department, especially in the furnaces for the smelting or manufacture on lead, must welcome any legislation of this character. I know there always will be certain neglect on the part of the workpeople themselves. We have provisions for the erection of baths and various cleansing places, but they are very often neglected by the people most concerned. I would emphasise the importance of enforcing the application of the remedy both on the employer and the workpeople. Unless some power is given to compel the employers to provide and the workers to use the remedy provided, I am sure the Bill will not be of real service. Of course the war period has been an exceptional time. Many rules have been loosely applied and the number of factory inspectors has been reduced almost to vanishing point, so that there has not been effective control as before. But those lapsed rules ought not to be permitted to continue in abeyance under peace conditions. The Labour party welcomes the Bill.

Sir F. BANBURY

I do not know enough of the process of work at furnaces where lead is used to say whether or not it is advisable to employ women. I understand from my hon. and gallant Friend (Major Hills) that there are very good reasons why women should not be employed in this work. I do not see why boys of seventeen-and-a-half years should not be employed. I should have thought it was just as bad to employ a boy of nineteen years as to employ a boy of seventeen-and-a-half years, but I do not pose as an authority on the point. It seems to me to be a very dangerous thing, and one which might possibly tend to the detriment of trade and commerce in this country, if legislation is to be introduced which has been decided upon by an international labour organisation. Personally, I do not know what the international labour organisation of the League of Nations is. I have no faith in the League of Nations; I believe it is a body which spends money and does nothing else. But I think it is a very serious thing to have legislation influenced by a labour organisation settled in Geneva, that organisation being composed of various representatives of all the nations of the world. I gather that we have only four representing us, two of them Government officials, one a representative of the employers, and one a representative of the workmen. If with a small minority representation like that we have to do whatever foreign nations tell us to do about trade and commerce, I fear it would be very much to the detriment of our trade. Trade should not be hampered. It is in a very parlous state at present. Many of these philanthropic resolutions might be resolutions passed by labour organisations which hitherto have not shown themselves anxious to increase production, which is the only thing to save this country. I should be very much obliged if the Home Secretary would tell us whether we are to have many more of these Bills, and whether our trade and commerce is to be directed by a hole-and-corner committee consisting of a few people, gathered from God knows where, and sitting in a foreign town? It is quite a new thing, and if this is to be part of the new world, I hope we shall remain in the old.

Sir J. D. REES

I confess that I share the apprehensions of the last speaker. I cannot understand how an international body of two or three gathered together in Geneva, supermen, is in any way competent to lay down regulations applicable to countries differing in every conceivable respect. I have myself seen the evils resulting from the ignorant application of principles applied in this country to mines, for instance, in India, and the damage and destruction caused to people who were making an honourable, honest, comfortable livelihood in that country by the application to them of rules and regulations which have no sort of relation to the conditions obtaining there. That is an evil of which I have had many manifestations. Hon. Gentlemen opposite think, no doubt with the best possible intentions, that a good principle is equally applicable everywhere. In this Bill that process is extended to unimaginable lengths. These few people at Geneva are to be able to impose on British industry any principles of which they may approve. As my right hon. Friend said, there are paltry little or, at any rate, small and unimportant nations who receive on these occasions equal representation with great nations like ourselves who are in the van of industrial progress.

Sir F. BANBURY

I understand there is not even a woman on this organisation.

Sir J. D. REES

That is inexcusable, and I am sure it must vex my right hon. Friend very much. What troubles me most is that we in this country, who have been accustomed to lead in industrial progress, are to pay any attention to the representatives of small nations who have had no experience and no knowledge. I do not know why our representatives are to bind themselves and are these two or three men to be superior to the collective wisdom of His Majesty's Government. It may be perfectly right, and I dare say it is, that women should not be employed on this work. I do not for a moment dispute the propriety of not so employing women; but surely that is a thing which our Government and this country could discover for themselves. I do resent very much the kind of dictation which results from international labour organisations. We want to cut the canker of internationalism out of all this. Internationalism means the negation of patriotism and the abnegation of everything of which we should be proud. Instead of extending internationalism I long myself to see it abolished completely off the face of the earth. For that reason I resent this, not because it is not good, but because we are asked by an international organisation. I have seen principles laid down which had no application whatever to different parts of the British Empire. Here at the centre of the Empire and in this House of Commons we are asked to legislate by this body to which we owe no allegiance. I am not sent here by my constituents to adopt any legislation at the dictation of the Geneva International Convention, or any representatives from this country who may sit upon it, and who may, for all I know, not have the authority or knowledge or weight which would justify them in forcing us into this legislation.

Lieut.-Colonel Sir S. HOARE

I only rise to say one thing, and I should not have done so if it had not been for the amazing speeches we have heard from the right hon. and hon. Baronets who have just addressed the House. Both of them are old Parliamentarians. I am, therefore, very much surprised to hear them abusing a thing for which, I believe, both of them actually voted only a few months ago. The hon. Baronet (Sir J. D. Rees) looks as if he doubted the truth of that statement. I would remind him that this was part and parcel of the Peace Treaty, and if I remember aright, we had a Division on the Peace Treaty, and the hon. Baronet and the right hon. Baronet voted for its ratification. I do not think I need say anything further.

Sip F. BANBURY

May I point out that I had no choice. I could not amend it, and I had to vote for the whole of it or against it.

Lieut.-Colonel RAW

I welcome the introduction of this Bill. The conclusions which have been arrived at have been formed after very careful investigation by experts. It may be argued that Clause 2 makes some differentiation between males and females. The effect of lead on women is must more important than on men, and for that reason there ought to be some differentiation between males and females in this industrial employment. I am perfectly certain if the Clauses of this Bill are carefully carried out the whole object of the Home Secretary will be achieved, namely, to defend the industrial worker against the serious effects of lead. We know as medical men that lead not only has immediate effects, but that its effects last for a very great number of years afterwards, ending very often in incurable conditions. I congratulate the Home Secretary on the introduction of the Bill, and I hope in the interests of the workers themselves that it will be given a Second reading.

Lieut. - Commander KENWORTHY

I rise because of the speech of the hon. Baronet (Sir J. D. Rees) of which I heard the last few sentences. In that speech he attacked this Bill not on the merits but because it came as the result of a labour conference held at Washington, under the auspices of the League of Nations. It is speeches like that and the speech of the right hon. Baronet (Sir F. Banbury) which are reported by the enemies of the League of Nations abroad. Those two speeches will be reported verbatim in certain newspapers in the United States of America, partly, of course, because of the great eloquence and the language used, but, more important still, because they attack the principle of the League of Nations and the principle of legalised internationalism which will be the final outcome of the League of Nations, and which, though it may take a long time, will, I hope, come. I am glad that the hon. Member for Chelsea (Sir S. Hoare) rose, and I think it is the duty of somebody on this side to rise also, and repudiate the sentiments expressed by the two hon. Baronets. I believe that those speeches represent about a twentieth part of this House and that if a vote were taken as to whether we should ratify the agreements reached by our representatives at Washington they would not bring half a dozen Members into the lobby against them.

Sir F. BANBURY

As far as I know every single person in this country, with one or two exceptions, thinks the League of Nations is nonsense.

Lieut.-Commander KENWORTHY

I know that at the General Election in 1918, in answer to a specific question sent out by the League of Nations Union, a private body of rather important people, there were only about a score of candidates who did not unhesitatingly endorse the principle of the League of Nations, and every party in this House has paid lip service to it. Both the twin Leaders of the present Government, the leader of the Labour party, the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Paisley (Mr. Asquith), and the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Peebles (Sir D. Maclean) have approved of its principle. I think it is the duty of hon. Members to repudiate in the most emphatic language the speeches we have had from the two hon. Baronets

Captain ELLIOT

I do not think anybody who heard the speeches from the right hon. Baronet (Sir F. Banbury) and the hon. Baronet (Sir J. D. Rees) should allow them to pass unchallenged, especially when the great word "patriotism" is misused in this connection. We had the hon. Member for Nottingham (Sir J. D. Rees) saying that internationalism is the negation of patriotism, and using that to attack a Bill to prevent the employment of women on lead processes. It is all very well to crack jokes, but the use of lead and the absorption of lead into the human body, though not a severe thing for a man is for a woman, and is the cause of abortion and other complaints. When an agreement like this is reached after getting together the representatives of all the civilised countries and is brought back to this House, instead of being received as an honest attempt to get forward with the work of making the health of the people of the country better, you have hon. Baronets cracking jokes about it as if it were something amusing. There is nothing amusing about it.

Sir J. D. REES

Please distinguish between your Baronets.

Captain ELLIOT

I apologise to either of the hon. Baronets whose remarks I may have considered humorous. I ask the pardon of the House if I have spoken with too much heat, but I speak as one who has had some acquaintance with this matter, and it is a tragic and a fearful business. However faulty the attempt may be to carry out the agreement, it should not be criticised on the ground that, instead of being the work of this country unaided, it is the work of this country in conjunction with others. I add my voice to those who hope that the Bill will get a Second Reading.

Mr. BETTERTON

I welcome this Bill from a rather different point of view, and quite apart from the motives of humanity, with which I entirely agree. In years past it has been urged that British trade was affected by giving a higher degree of protection to the worker than that which obtained in other countries. So far as I know, this is the first organised attempt to ensure that the same measure of protection should be given to the workers in whatever country they live, and therefore to put them on the same footing. Therefore, in addition to the humanitarian motive, which I completely support, I support the proposal also on the ground that I think it will be an advantage to British trade.

5.0 P.M.

Mr. SHORTT

I desire to answer certain questions which were put to me. With regard to Clause 1, which prohibits entirely the employment of women and young persons in certain of these processes, I may say that substantially our existing Regulations have prohibited the employment of women and children in those processes for some years past. There are some such processes in which women and children never, have been employed, and the passing of this Bill will render such Regulations unnecessary if any attempt were made to employ them. With regard to Clause 2, there are a certain number of minor industries—I have got a list of them here: perambulators, leather buttons, and all sorts of things of that kind—where these provisions have not been in force, but substantially the passing of this Bill simply makes permanent what we have been doing.

Question, "That the Bill be now read a Second time," put, and agreed to.

Bill read a Second time.

Bill committed to a Committee of the Whole House for To-morrow.—[Mr. Shortt.]