THE SWEATING COMMISSION.

Te Aroha News, Volume VII, Issue 470, 10 May 1890, Page 5

THE SWEATING COMMISSION.

FORECAST OF THE REPORT. Wellington, May 6. The Sweating Commissioners have finally revised and adopted the draft of their report. The report has not been made public, but it is understood that a sweeping recommendation is likely to be made that workshops and workrooms of all descriptions shall be made subject to the Factories Act, and furthermore, that a register of such establishments, large and small, shall be kept, and registration by the proprietors be made compulsory. The stringent observance of sanitary arrangements will also be insisted upon, and means will be suggested under which due attention to this provision can be enforced. That the age and educational qualifications that entitle a boy or girl to work in a factory will be raised is reckoned upon almost to a certainty, while a very considerable extension of the powers of factory inspectors may also be looked for. The laxity of the apprenticeship system in vogue in the colony has been so forcibly put before the Commissioners in all parts of the colony that it is believed a majority of their number are prepared to recommend that legislation should be introduced to compel the substitution of proper indentures for a reasonable term for the mere agreements betwsen parent and employer that now prevail so generally. Another favourite scheme of some members of the Commission is the insistance upon the affixing of a registered trade mark to all manufactured goods, and some modification of this idea will probably be contained in the report. Another widely-spread impression is that the Commission will propose a system of registration of servants’ registry offices, and regulations for the method of conducting them. An acknowledgment of the good work done by the Trades Unions in preventing the lowering of wages to any unreasonable level, and in limiting the hours of labour, may also be looked for. The Commissioners will draw the attention of the Government to the grievances of subcontractors, railway servants, and also to the long hours worked by mercantile and bank clerks. The report of the Commission generally is expected to be in the direction that there is no practical existence of the sweating system in New Zealand, but that numerous complaints have been made to them of the increase in the hours worked with reduction in wages. The latter, however, is attributed to competition. It is understood that the Commissioners will make no specific recommendation regarding early closing.