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XI

exist, making the use of such articles dangerous for the general public. The provision in our Factories Act that all garments made in a non-registered factory are to bear a label stating that it was made in an unregistered factory has so far been successful in preventing these evils in New Zealand. The showing of this exhibit has convinced thousands of our colonists how necessary it is to render such a shocking state of affairs impossible in this colony. Such great interest was taken in this exhibit that requests have come in from some of our larger towns in the colony requesting that the exhibit be shown. The requests have been granted, and the exhibit will be shown in Dunedin, Invercargill, Timaru, Auckland, Napier, Wanganui, Palmerston North, Nelson, and Wellington. In connection with the Exhibition, two special publications were issued; one was entitled 'Handbook to the Labour Laws," and the other "The Department of Labour: its Organization and Work." Both publications have proved very popular, and, as the latter pamphlet is almost out of print, it is being republished as a preface to the book dealing with the Department's exhibit. This combined volume should prove of great interest to our foreign correspondents, for, besides containing a complete history of the Department and its work, valuable statistical charts will be reproduced and issued for the first time. Special chapters will also deal with the Workers' Dwellings Act, the Shearers' Accommodation Act, and other Acts administered by the Department. At the close of the Exhibition, Captain Atkin (British Commissioner), on behalf of the English Labour Department (Board of Trade), presented to the Department a most valuable collection of charts illustrating the statistics of trade employment conditions of labour in the United Kingdom. These charts were specially prepared for the New Zealand Exhibition by the Commercial Labour and Statistical Department of the Board of Trade. The charts, twenty-eight in number, have been prepared to illustrate the statistics of the United Kingdom relating to the following subjects: Distribution of the industrial population according to occupations, employment, rates of wages, prices, consumption of various dutiable articles and of wheat, proportionate cost of various articles of food, pauperism, foreign trade, shipping and railway traffic, production and consumption of certain raw materials and manufactures, trade disputes causing stoppage of work, tradeunions, workmen's co-operative societies, and fatal industrial accidents. These charts will prove of great value to the Department not only from a statistical point of view, but as a guide towards which the Department might work to illustrate its own industrial progress. Correspondence. This branch of the Department's work continues to expand annually, as the following return will show:— .... ~ „__,„ . 1905-6. 1903 7. Outw.-rd. Inward. OutwrA Inward. Letters ... ... 6,630 7,060 9,130 9,943 Telegrams ... ... 960 1,530 1,680 Circulars and circular letters ... ... 6,000 ... 11,650 Our oversea correspondence still continues to increase; the inquiries generally made are mainly in regard to prospects of employment in the colony, and the working of our labour legislation (especially in regard to the so-called compulsory Arbitration Act). Great care is taken to give correct information to intending immigrants, and no trouble is spared to find out exactly where their services are most likely to be required. Employment Bureau. The number of persons assisted by the Department for the year is 7,393, which constitutes a record; the number assisted last year, 6,712, was the next highest. These figures comprise the record of men sent to Government and to private employment, but what was a few years ago termed the " unemployed difficulty " does not now exist, as work of some sort can always be found for all except the physically unfit. A pleasing feature is the continued growth of the number assisted to private employment. The Department has long since succeeded in gaining the confidence of employers in the engaging of servants, and last year no less than 2,718 men were sent to private emphryers. The demand for farm labourers again exceeded the supply, and so pronounced did the difficulty become of getting capable hands that farmers were pleased to take newcomers and untrained hands, and teach them the work in order to get their work done. Good wages were offered even to inexperienced hands, usually ranging from £1 to £1 7s. 6d. per week and found, and even higher. Another pleasing feature to be reported is the almost entire absence of serious complaints from co-operative workers. Despite the fact that a very much larger number of men has been employed on these works than for many years past, the men seem to be generally content, and to be able to earn very fair wages.