§ Mr. VazTo ask the Secretary of State for Employment how many employers have been prosecuted for not registering their home workers with the environmental health department; whether he has any plans to introduce measures to strengthen the law; and if he will make a statement.
§ Mr. NichollsThis information could be obtained only at disproportionate cost from individual local authorities.
The Government have no plans to extend the law which was originally part of the Factory and Workshop Act 1901—now section 133 of the Factories Act 1961—and was introduced to prevent the spread of infectious disease and infestations from the home. Home workers have the same legal protection for health and safety as other employees and self-employed workers under the provisions of the Health and Safety at Work etc. Act 1974.
§ Mr. VazTo ask the Secretary of State for Employment how many home workers' projects are in existence in England and Wales; what are their main tasks; and if he will make a statement.
§ Mr. NichollsThe Department is aware of a number of groups which promote the interests of home workers but does not systematically collect information about their numbers and activities.
§ Mr. VazTo ask the Secretary of State for Employment how many home workers the wages inspectorate visited in the past year; and if he will make a statement.
§ Mr. NichollsIn 1989 the wages inspectorate checked the pay of 874 home workers by means of visits to establishments putting out work. These checks involved subsequent visits to a sample of home workers concerned, but records are not kept of the number so visited.
§ Mr. VazTo ask the Secretary of State for Employment how many industrial tribunal cases have been adjudicated in favour of home workers in the last year.
§ Mr. NichollsThis information is not available and could be obtained only at disproportionate cost.
§ Mr. VazTo ask the Secretary of State for Employment how many visits he or his predecessor made to home working projects in England and Wales in the past five years.
§ Mr. NichollsNone.
§ Mr. VazTo ask the Secretary of State for Employment what industries in England and Wales employ the largest percentage of home workers; what are their main tasks; and what are the rates of pay in each of these industries.
§ Mr. NichollsFigures showing those industries which employ the largest percentage of home workers and their254W occupations are not available for England and Wales. National estimates and occupational distributions can be found in tables 3.1, 3.3, 3.4, 3.5, 3.7 and 3.8 of Department of Employment research paper No. 60 by Dr. Catherine Hakim entitled "Home-based Work in Britain: A report on the 1981 National Homeworking Survey and the DE research programme on homework". Tables 6.4 to 6.8 in that report provide information on earnings of home workers at the time the research was carried out. A copy of the paper has been placed in the Library. General earnings data for these industries can be found in tables 8 and 9 of part A of the 1989 new earnings survey, a copy of which is in the Library, but these data do not distinguish home workers' earnings from the earnings of other workers.
§ Mr. VazTo ask the Secretary of State for Employment what measures he intends to take to ensure that employers supplying work to home workers adhere to the Noise at Work Regulations 1989; and if he will make a statement.
§ Mr. NichollsThe Noise at Work Regulations apply to home workers in just the same way as to any other employee or self-employed person. When inspectors of health and safety visit employers, including those who employ home workers, they consider compliance with these regulations and take enforcement action where necessary.
§ Mr. VazTo ask the Secretary of State for Employment what percentage of home workers the wages council found illegally underpaid for each of the past 10 years, by year; and if he will make a statement.
§ Mr. NichollsThe information requested is shown as follows:
Year Per Cent. 1980 6.23 1981 5.46 1982 8.32 1983 2.98 1984 6.47 1985 1.30 1986 0.58 1987 1.63 1988 1.03 1989 0.91
§ Mr. VazTo ask the Secretary of State for Employment whether he has any plans to require employers to provide proper handling guidelines for any potentially dangerous glues and solvents that home workers may be required to use; and if he will make a statement.
§ Mr. NichollsThe Health and Safety at Work etc. Act 1974 provides a framework of legislative controls to protect all those at work including home workers.
In addition, the Control of Substances Hazardous to Health Regulations 1988 require all employers to assess risk, identify the precautions that employees have to take when handling hazardous substances and provide the employees with information about the risk and the precautions. These provisions extend to glues and solvents where these may be a hazard to health.
Where home workers are self-employed, those supplying them with substances are required under section 6 of HSWA to provide adequate information about any risks to health and safety.
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§ Mr. VazTo ask the Secretary of State for Employment whether his Department has formulated any definition of home working with regard to its present policies; and if he will make a statement.
§ Mr. NichollsThe Department regards home workers as those working at home rather than using home as a base. No more precise definition is currently in use.