The Factories Bill.

Waimate Daily Advertiser, Volume IV, Issue 263, 30 September 1902, Page 1

The Factories Bill.

In committee of the House on the Factories Act Amendment Bill, Major Steward moved a new clause empowering local authorities in boroughs and town districts to declare another day than Saturday for the weekly half-holiday for factories. Sir .1. G. Ward thought that this proposal went too far, as t would mean the splitting up of the holiday among the t'ndes. Instead of it he moved a new clause to provide i bat in any borough or town district having a population of less than 10,003, if Saturday is found inconvenient for the weekly half-holiday under the Factories Act, the local authority may substitute another day for it. Major Steward accepted this clause in place of Ids own. Mr Amo d said t hat the Labour Hi! s (’ommitteo had carefully considered the clause proposed by Sir Joseph Ward, and had unanimously decided that it should not he included in the Bill, Several speakers urged that the House should not take any step that would tend to detrimentally affect the Saturday half-holiday system, whilst others urged that allowance should be made in the case of small country factories.

After farther discussion Sir J. G. Ward’s new clause was read a second time by 32 votes to 20 votes, Mr Millar complained that the Government had sprung a surprise on the House in that the clause in last year’s Act, making Saturday the half-holiday for factories, had been agreed to after a seven years’ trial of the old system, and after hearing the opinions of all parties concerned, and with the unanimous consent of the Workers and employers. He objected that in the present case no employers’ association, trades council or factory proprietor had been consulted in the matter. He deliberately accused the Government of having, during the past eleven months, wilfully broken the law under the Act. Saturday was the half-holiday for factories, and yet the Government bad, in any number of boroughs, allowed some other day to be observed. The Hon W. Hall-Jones said that the proposed new clause only applied to a business which came under both the Factories Act and Shop Hours Act, and where factory employees in the establishment bad their half-holiday on Saturday and the shop assistants had their half-holiday on some other day, this clause would enable them to have their half-holiday on the same day. He would be willing to I in-fit, a provision that no alteration i for she day of the half holiday | eh" i d be made under the clause mi rss a majority of the facioiy pint' oyees were in favour of it. Ho rend a. long list of boroughs that h:i< 1 requested the alteration now pro; nsed. A long discussion ensued, in the course of which Sir J. G. Ward suggested an amendment somewhat on the lines of that indicated by the lion W. Hall-Jones. Mr G. W. Russell urged that there should be no compromise, and pointed out that there were only five places in the colony— Auckland, Wellington, Christchurch, Sydenham and Dunedin—which could not under this clause be exempted from the provisions of the Factories Act so far as the Saturday half-holiday was concerned. After two hours’ discussion the motion to report progress was carried by 35 votes.