§ THE EARL OF ABERDEEN, in moving for Returns on the 1st of May of the number of persons employed on each of the railways of the United Kingdom (classified according to the nature of the work performed by them), said, those Returns, in addition to the Returns which the companies were already bound to furnish, would show the proportion between the number of railway servants injured and the total number employed. It might be said, by way of objection, that the publication of such Returns and of the comparisons of the two classes of figures, would be an interference between employers and employed. But who were the employers of railway servants? Their work was of such a nature that they were brought into direct communication with the public, and might be regarded in one sense as public servants. At all events, if they made any mistake leading to serious results, they would soon discover that they had two masters, for the railway companies would dismiss them, and the public would punish them for their neglect. In alluding to this aspect of the matter, he thought it right to say that he would be the last to come forward as a reckless declaimer against railway Directors. He believed that the more one became acquainted with the working and management of railway's, the more he would be able to appreciate the difficulties which railway Directors had to contend with in conducting the business of a railway. But the same acquaintance with the practical working of a railway which would reveal the difficulties which the Directors had to encounter would also reveal the difficulties which railway servants had to meet and overcome in the discharge of their duty—difficulties, too, which arose from no fault of their own. If the Returns for which he moved were granted, he indulged a hope that the information which they would afford might ultimately be of benefit to railway servants, and that they might also be useful in a wider sense as a contribution—although a humble one—towards the adjustment of certain large questions to which public attention was now being directed, among others the question of compensation to injured railway employés. In the discussion, too, of the still larger question 265 as to the future management of railways, there could be no doubt that the number of persons employed upon them would be an important, as it had often been a disputed, point.
§ THE DUKE OF RICHMONDsuggested that the Return should have reference to the 31st of December last.
§ THE EARL OF ABERDEENassented.
§
Motion amended, and agreed to.
Returns of the number of persons employed on the 31st of December last on each of the Railways of the United Kingdom (classified according to the nature of the work performed by them).
§ Ordered to be laid before the House.
§ House adjourned at half-past Six o'clock to Thursday next, half-past Tcn o'clock.