§ 30. Captain ELLIOTasked the Minister of Labour whether any decision on the case of the woman bakers of Glasgow recently dismissed under threat of a strike has yet been come to by the Scottish Bakers' Industrial Council; whether it is the case that one woman in the oatcake-making industry had been for sixteen years working at her trade before this dismissal; and whether, in view of the hardships that such cases entail, he will recommend that these women be temporarily reinstated and their case investigated before, instead of after, they are thrown out of employment?
§ 93. Mr. SEDDONasked the Secretary for Scotland whether his attention has been called to the agreements between the master bakers and men's union to return to pre-War conditions, which are having the effect of displacing many women who were employed in the pre-War period with no benefit to the men, while creating great hardship upon many women; whether the masters' association and the men's union are in entire disagreement with the interpretation of the clauses in the agreement dealing with pre-War women workers; and, if so, he will cause inquiry to be made into this admitted hardship?
§ Dr. MACNAMARAThe scheme dealing with the employment of women in this trade, which has been prepard by the Scottish Bakers' Industrial Council, and to which I referred in my reply to my hon. and gallant Friend (Captain Elliot) on the 28th October, is, I understand, now awaiting consideration by the Scottish Master Bakers' Association, and by the Executive Committee of the Scottish Bakers' Operatives' Union. The question of the temporary reinstatement of the dismissed women is a matter for agreement between these bodies, who are fully aware of the circumstances of the case, and I fear that I could not usefully intervene in the matter at the present time. I am sending my hon. Friend the Member for the, Henley Division (Mr. Seddon) a copy of my reply of 28th October on this subject to my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Lanark.
Mr. MacCALLUM SCOTTMay I ask whether the right hon. Gentleman can give an assurance that in this industrial dispute, in which women only seem to be concerned, he will take all the steps that he would take if it had been a case in which men only were concerned?
§ Dr. MACNAMARACertainly. There is no reason, if I may say so, for making that suggestion to me.