HC Deb 22 July 1929 vol 230 cc907-8
63. Mr. REGINALD YOUNG

asked the First Comimissioner of Works if any salary or wage-earners employed in his Department, or employed by contractors working under agreement with his Department, are not allowed annual holidays with pay; and whether, if this is so, he is able to take steps whereby his own Department and his contractors will grant this right?

Mr. LANSBURY

So far as direct employés are concerned, the general rule in my Department is to grant holidays with pay to all full-time employés engaged for regular work (including seasonal work). The only exceptions to this rule are caretakers, who, in my Department as in all other Departments of the Service, continue to receive their pay when absent from duty, but are required to provide suitable substitutes at their own expense. An extension of the right to these employés and to employés engaged for temporary work, or as temporary substitutes for regular employés, is a matter that could only be considered in connection with a review of the general service arrangements for granting holidays with pay. The conditions granted to the employés of contractors working under agreement wish my Department have to satisfy tin: terms of the Fair Wages Resolution, and I have no power to call upon contractors to grant conditions which are more favourable than those commonly recognised by employers and trade societies in the trade in the district where the work is carried out.

Mr. ALBERY

Can the right hon. Gentleman give any reason why caretakers should be excepted?

Mr. LANSBURY

Because they have privileges which other workmen do not possess.

Mr. W. J. BROWN

Is not the right hon. Gentleman aware that the Civil Service practice is to give leave with pay, and without calling upon the individual civil servant to find a substitute; and, if that is the general Civil Service practice, why cannot he apply it to these poor charwomen?

Mr. LANSBURY

I am not aware that it is the general Civil Service practice in regard to caretakers. I am not aware that that practice differs in any way from that which obtains in the Department of the First Commissioner of Works.

Mr. H. W. WALLACE

Is the general review to be undertaken by the right hon. Gentleman's Department?

Mr. LANSBURY

No, Sir. It is not.