H.—ll

V

sale makes their place of industry a factory has not altered since 1895, so the numerical conditions are equal as to the persons so enumerated as in a factory :—

In submitting those figures relating to employment in factories, I beg to call attention to the sudden falling-ofi in the year as to the annual increase in persons employed ; the steady rates of such increases having been proofs of satisfactory industrial progress during many years. The diminution may be owing to any one of several causes or to several acting together. Among these may be mentioned the growing difficulty of procuring young people as beginners in the clothing and food trades. As I stated in last year's report, there is, and will be for some time, an industrial shortage of New-Zealand-born boys and girls, because there are few children between five and fifteen years of age to take the places of their elders at work when death, marriage, sickness, or other cause makes a vacancy in the busy ranks. Had it not been for the arrival of thousands of immigrant families, the younger members of which have taken factory employment, the want of hands in some manufactures would have greatly crippled business. The following figures may be useful to show how families among the workers in the Dominion have decreased in a few years : —

Married Men assisted by Department of Labour from Start of Department in June, 1891, to 1909.

Note.—lt is not suggested that these figures should be compared with figures in the census returns, because the latter deal with the whole family, while these now presented refer only to young ones dependent on the father. The same rule, however, is here applied for 1892 and 1909, so that it is a fair comparison for the young children. These figures appear to show that the decline in the birth-rate is not by any means confined to those classes of the community which are sometimes referred to as being enervated by luxury. The number of persons dependent on the married workers who received assistance from the Department of

Year. Factories. Increase. Factory-workers. Increase. 1895 1896 1897 1898 1899 1900 1901 1902 1903 * ... 1904 1905 1906 1907 1908 1909 Total increase ... J 4,109 4,647 5,177 5,601 6,286 6,438 6,744 7,203 7,675 8,373 9,123 9,881 10,788 11,586 12,040 538 530 424 685 152 306 459 472 698 750 758 907 798 454 29,879 32,387 36,918 39,672 45,305 48,938 53,460 55,395 59,047 63,968 67,713 70,403 75,310 78,625 78,848 2,508 4,531 2,754 5,633 3,633 4,522 1,935 3,652 4,921 3,745 2,690 4,907 3,315 223 7,931 48,969

Year ending 31st Maroh, Number of Married Men. Number of Dependent Children. Percentage of Dependent Children to each Man. 1892 1893 1894 1895 1896 1897 1898 1899 1900 1901 1902 1903 1904 1905 1906 1907 1908 1909 1,054 1,808 1,836 2,007 1,880 1,084 1,163 1,178 1,115 1,326 713 1,492 777 953 2,027 1,427 1,440 2,538 3,675 5,713 5,638 6,546 6,214 3,437 3,458 3,300 3,032 3,567 1,700 3,633 2,308 2,254 4,335 2,399 2,808 4,514 3-48 3-16 3-07 3-26 3-30 3-16 2-97 2-80 2-71 2-69 2-38 243 2-95 2-36 2-08 1-68 1-95 1-77