LABOUR AND HEALTH BUILDINGS, GREAT BRITAIN. (Hansard, 9 April 1934)

§ Mr. RHYS DAVIES
It is not my intention to detain the Committee long, but it was thought wise that the attention of the right hon. Gentleman should be called to the items on page 12 of the Estimates. The right hon. Gentleman is in charge of all the Employment Exchange buildings and I desire to call special attention to what is happening in connection with them. The House has dealt this evening almost exclusively with housing and slum clearance, and I can assure the Committee that some of these Employment Exchanges might very well fall into the category of and be treated as slums.

§ Mr. ORMSBY-GORE
Hear, hear!

§ Mr. DAVIES
I am glad that the right hon. Gentleman agrees with me. I desire to raise one point in particular. The right hon. Gentleman's Department, in putting up a new Employment Exchange in any town, does not provide the obvious thing, namely, sanitary conveniences for the people who go there to register. The Trades Union Congress has made representations to the Ministry of Labour, and the trade councils in several towns have made similar representations to their local authorities. We are in the anomalous position, however, that the Ministry of Labour disclaims any liability, the right hon. Gentleman representing the Works Department disclaims any liability, and the local authorities also disclaim any liability for providing these conveniences. 133 Consequently, the Trades Union Congress made representation—

The DEPUTY-CHAIRMAN
I think it will be more in keeping with the practice of the Committee if the hon. Gentleman would attach his remark to one of the proposed new works on page 18.

§ Mr. DAVIES
That is what I was about to do. I was going to refer to the new Employment Exchange building in Sheffield, and I am sorry that the hon. Member for one of the Sheffield Divisions is not now in his place. I have copies of the correspondence which has passed, which I do not intend to read, but which I will refer to briefly. On a vacant site in the city of Sheffield, which has now a very intelligent council governing it, the Ministry of Labour and the Office of Works have proceeded to build a new Employment Exchange, but, in spite of the fact that they are expending a good deal of money on it, there is no provision of sanitary conveniences at all there. I do not want to go through the whole list of new buildings and alterations to buildings in various parts of the country, but I would appeal to the right hon. Gentleman to let us know to-night who it is that is responsible for the provision for which I am asking. There is no sense in three public Departments arguing with the Trades Union Congress that not one of them is responsible for providing sanitary conveniences near these Exchanges. I want the right hon. Gentleman to give us some hope that, when formulating his plans for the future, he will look into this problem once again to see if something cannot be done to redress this grievance.

§ Mr. ORMSBY-GORE
I am sorry that the hon. Gentleman did not let me know that he was going to raise this specific point, or I would have looked into it. As I understand it, the general position which my Department has always taken up is that the provision of public lavatories is essentially a local sanitary service. Local authorities almost everywhere provide public lavatories, and certainly we do not contemplate turning Employment Exchanges into places which the general public can use as sanitary conveniences. That would be extremely undesirable. There might be a special exception in a case where an Employment Exchange was nowhere near a public 134 convenience. As a rule, however, when selecting sites for permanent Employment Exchanges, we endeavour to get as central a position as possible, though not actually on a main street itself, and usually the public conveniences are not very far away. Further, if we started providing public conveniences, either my Department or the Ministry of Labour would have to employ a cleaning staff and a staff to receive payments, and that would overlap with the public authority's staff, and would be a great difficulty. In a few Exchanges there are what might be called emergency provisions—an internal lavatory for the staff, particularly for the women staff, which could be used in case of emergency; but I do not really think there is a case for my Department to embark on making provision of this kind.
On another point I quite agree that a large number of temporary places are still used as Employment Exchanges, though unsuitable for the purpose. It is the policy of my Department, as soon as we can get the sites, to put up permanent buildings. The reason why this Vote is so much larger this year is that whereas last year only 22 new Exchanges were being commenced, this year there are no fewer than 63. When those are completed we shall have broken the back of the problem, but there will still remain about 130 buildings which will be gradually replaced by permanent buildings in the coming years. We are making a special effort this year to erect up-to-date Employment Exchange buildings of a good type. I think that any hon. Member who has seen our recent Employment Exchanges will agree that they are both convenient and suitable, in place of the slum Exchanges.
In every case we want to discourage people hanging about the Employment Exchanges, and I know that the Ministry of Labour entirely agree with us. We do not want to build great waiting rooms, because the important thing is to arrange that people who come to seek work, to use the Exchange for unemployment insurance, or otherwise for strictly Exchange purposes, should do so in accordance with a time schedule. They should come in blocks at a time, rather than all together when they cannot be accommodated. It is not the policy of my Department to erect large waiting rooms because people would only get in each others 135 way and render the task of the staff of the Exchange in dealing with the business of the applicants more difficult and troublesome. That is an additional reason why it is very undesirable that we should embark upon erecting blocks of public lavatories in connection with these Exchanges.

§ Mr. RHYS DAVIES
Does the right hon. Gentleman's Department at any time get into touch with the local authorities in order to see whether Employment Exchanges can be built in such places that the problem of sanitary convenience will not be so troublesome in future? The right hon. Gentleman must know that a very large number of people have to attend the Employment Exchanges from time to time.

§ Mr. ORMSBY-GORE
In selecting a site for an Employment Exchange we endeavour to select a convenient place, where there are transport facilities and which is near, as it were, a centre where people come together. In those centres, and in that kind of neighbourhood, it is the duty of every local authority to provide sanitary accommodation.

§ Mr. ANEURIN BEVAN
Who is responsible for the maintenance of buildings which are used as branch Exchanges and which are not under the direct governance of the Civil Service?

§ Mr. ORMSBY-GORE
If the building is taken for any length of time on a lease, my Department would arrange the lease for the Ministry of Labour. If it was under the control of a local authority arrangements would be made with the Ministry of Labour.

§ Mr. BEVAN
Part of our difficulty is that we cannot raise the question of the condition of those buildings because the right hon. Gentleman is not directly responsible, but in very many eases those buildings are in a highly undesirable 136 state. I do not know whether it would be in order if I just say a word—

The DEPUTY-CHAIRMAN
I am afraid that the question of buildings that are hired does not arise on this Vote. Whether it would or would not arise on the Ministry of Labour Vote I cannot express an opinion, but it does not arise on this Vote which is for new works, alterations, additions and purchases.