REGULATION OF FEMALE EMPLOYMENT.

New Zealand Times, Volume XXX, Issue 4525, 21 September 1875, Page 2

REGULATION OF FEMALE EMPLOYMENT.

TO THE EDITOR OF THE NEW ZEALAND TIMES. Sik,—We trust that the present session of Parliament will not close without some further amendment in the Act passed in 1573, for the regulation of female employment. As the Act and the Amendment Act of last year now stand, it cun only be looked upon as the most blundering piece of legislation ever enacted, and is a monument of the folly of people legislating upon things they do not understand. If, when the Bill was in committee, business men of position employing females had been examined with a view of giving information upon the matter, such a Bill would never have passed in its present anomalous state. The part to which we call attention are those clauses which bring within the operation of the Act young persons engaged as saleswomen and milliners in retail drapery establishments. Employers of labor in this direction do not object to wholesome legislation for young people engaged in bona fide factories where work is frequently carried on in an impure atmosphere, and where the girls employed very commonly receive for their labor a sum far less than that obtained by domestic servants, but they do object to have brought within the meaning of any Factory Act young people employed in places of business as milliners, and, indeed, as saleswomen in any trade. Young people employed as saleswomen and milliners differ from persons employed in factories as follows:—Their salaries are often as high as those obtained by professional men ; their occupation is the lightest that can come within the meaning of the word "employment;" during a great deal of their time they have absolutely nothing to do ; they pass their few hours of employment in spacious well-ventilated rooms ; if absent from illness or pleasure, their salaries as a rule are not mulcted ; they expect preferment only by studying the interest of their employers, and this the Act distinctly forbids them doing, for it says they shall not work after 2 p.m. on Saturdays. This, as is knowu by everyone, is the most needful time of all, on account of so many things being required for Sunday. Factory hands are kept at one Incessant grind from their entrance to work until their exit, and they are charged cash week with every half-hour's absence. We can recognise the wisdom of the British Legislature curtailing the grinding work of the factory class. But, sir, no British Parliament has ever degraded its power by interfering with the rights of the commercial class, and saying such and such hours shall your wellpaid assistants work. It would be no less unwarrantable were the Legislature to define our diet and clothing and time of going to bed. You, sir, will confer a great boon upon a very important section of the community by agitating for an alteration in the obnoxious clauses. The Act states S a.m. as the time for going to work ; as if every man of business did not know well enough that young ladies in his employ would not be required at that hour, besides which some few would not come if wanted, although those same few would take the benefit of the Act in so far as it relates to 2 p.m. on Saturday. It may not be out of place here to mention that m very great part the increased tariff tells more heavily upon the importer than upon the consumer, in so far as our business is concerned, and this we could demonstrate fully. So that it appears on the surface that the Assembly which increased the Customs duties almost at the same time increased the difficulties of making our business remunerative and enabling us to meet those same increased charges, by forbidding well-paid hands serving their employers with zeal, but by Act of Parliament only. We have no wish to speak with asperity, but hope that our remarks have tended to show that the Act is one of the most ill-conceived possible. The police have taken no notice of the matter except in isolated cases where information has been given, and a summons was compulsory. The fact of the law being ignored by all parties is a sufficient proof, if no other were wanting, of its unsuitableness. Perhaps you can tell whether the Act is observed at the Printing and Telegraph departments. Although, as remarked, the Act is already almost in abeyance, yet it will bo more satisfactory to have it altered this session. We trust, therefore, that you sir, and .the Press generally, and particularly the Legislative Assembly, will take the matter up, and remedy the evil at once.—We are, &c, Wilson and Richardson.