§ THE EARL OF SHAFTESBURY, in rising to move for a Commission to inquire into the moral and physical condition of milliners and dressmakers, said: It will not be necessary that I should enter into any lengthened statement in support of the Motion which I am about to make. Some time ago an inquiry was made into the condition of dressmakers and milliners, and some most fearful evidence was received. An association was formed, and the evils were in some measure mitigated. That Commission consisted of three Gentlemen who were most competent to carry on the inquiry, and he thought it would be extremely desirable to refer the question to them, in the hope that they would be able to devise some means by which the evils of the present system might be redressed. The season, he might add, was now drawing to a close, and the pressure on the establishments in which those milliners and dressmakers were employed would be in a great measure diminished, and the effect he hoped of a reference of the subject to the Commission would be to keep those establishments within the limits 1755 of decency and order. The noble Earl then moved—
That an humble Address be presented to Her Majesty, praying that She will be graciously pleased to give Directions that an Inquiry should be made into the physical and moral Condition of the Milliners and Dressmakers by the Royal Commission now sitting on "the State of Children and young Persons in Trades and Manufactures not regulated by Law.
§ EARL GRANVILLEsaid, he found, on consulting his right hon. Friend the Secretary for the Home Department, that it was competent for him to refer the subject of the noble Earl's Motion to the Commission suggested. It had, he added, been already referred to them. Under those circumstances, an Address to Her Majesty was unnecessary.
§ Motion (by leave of the House) withdrawn.
§ House adjourned at a quarter before Nine o'clock, till To-morrow, half past Ten o'clock.