In rising to move the second reading of this Bill, I quite recognise that after what we heard last Wednesday the whole position is changed. The Government have brought in their Bill, and, to a large extent, the two Bills cover the same ground. I think that in a certain way ours is better, but still we have not the same advantage as private Members in pressing it forward that the Government have. Since the Government have brought in their Bill, and since the principle of this Bill has been approved of, I do not think that any speech on the question of principles is now necessary. The principle is now admitted. We all see the evils of sweating, and all parties are agreed that the remedy has got to be a system of wages boards which will fix the minimum wage. In so far as the minimum wage is concerned, the two Bills are the same with certain variations, and I want to call the attention of the House to the points on which the two Bills differ. The Sweated Industries Bill proposes to start operations at once. It proposes that in certain scheduled trades the wages board should be appointed, and should start operations at once, and should fix the minimum wage, at least for the time, and that the wages should be compulsory, and that the regulation to pay them should be enforced by a penalty. The Government Bill, on the other hand, starts in this way. It sets up a period of six months during which the minimum wage to be established will not be enforcible by law. In this respect, and also in others, it is more of a permissive Bill than the Sweated Industries Bill. A second point is that it sets up a system of centralising organisation much more than the Sweated Industries Bill. In the Bill which we are now discussing wages boards are chosen from employers and employed in all districts, and these wages boards are more or less independent and autonomous bodies. In the Government Bill the wages boards are controlled by the Board of Trade, and I do think that that is a very strong objection to the Government Bill. One great advantage of wages boards is that they give organisation to a trade where no organisation already exists. It is not only the question of a minimum wage or of compulsion but it is the question of setting up a standard of value, and of crystallising an organisation that does not exist now: and for that reason I hope that when we come to discuss the Government Bill in Committee they will see their way to relax certain restrictions that they have provided and to start their wages board on independent lines. I do not think that the Board of Trade can control the industries of this country in the way that the Government Bill seems to set out. The only way you can do it is to start from the bottom and allow the employers and employed to meet together and as far as they can to fix a minimum wage; and then, as soon as it is fixed, I agree that you have got to enforce it. But the enforcing and the fixing ought to come from the wages boards themselves and ought not to be imposed from the top by the Board of Trade. While I say this I also wish to say quite frankly that the Government Bill includes valuable provisions, and I think it will do what is wanted; and as far as I am concerned I will support it. I beg to move the second reading of the Bill now before the House.

I beg to second the resolution. The House, I am sure, feels that it was very plucky of the hon. Member to come down to move the second reading of the Bill, an opportunity that the other friends of the Bill—a Bill with which we have been long connected—are very glad that he should have. I agree with everything that the hon. Member has said, except the words in regard to co-ordination, which is really a committee question. The principle of the Bill was unanimously affirmed by the House last year. I never saw a Bill more unanimously supported by the House, supported from every quarter; I mean by every shade in every quarter of the House, if I may use such a confusion of metaphor.

The principle goes, of course, further than the mere adoption of the principle of a minimum wage. It does require as an essential part of that principle inspection and enforcement of a satisfactory kind. As regards the details of the Bill, the views of the promoters of the Bill, I frankly say, have not been completely unanimous and completely uniform throughout. I was asked to give evidence, on behalf of the promoters of the Bill, before the Select Committee to which the Bill was referred last year after its second reading. I do not think they dissented from the suggestions that I made which were some modification upon the question of co-ordination. I alone am bound by the suggestions that I made in evidence, but they have passed unchallenged up till now. I do not object to co-ordination in the form proposed in the Board of Trade Bill. The two plans were stated the other day by the right hon. Gentleman in introducing the other Bill. I concur in the idea that led him to adopt that particular form. It does not commit anyone against the principle, thoroughly understood, of fixing the wage by voluntary agreement; but there is a difference in the co-ordination in the sense that the wage decisions should pass, instead of through a Trade Board official, through one considerable authority which is able to take a survey of the whole ground.

We ask for the experiment to be tried in a few trades, of which one must be a considerable trade carried on in different parts of the country and having an export to distant neutral foreign markets. This we desire in order to demonstrate that the worst evil can be met without a rise in prices. Those who fear a Bill of this sort fear that which we do not fear, that it will hinder the export trade by raising prices. Some of us have a very clear opinion that there is a very large margin of concealed trade prices in the export trade, and by reason of that margin I trust that we may be able to deal with the worst evils without raising the prices. For my own part, I believe the experiment will be completely successful. The other essential point is the inspection necessary to enforcement. The necessity of enforcement by penalty is now universally ad- mitted. It was not so in the early days. The Benthamites forced on Lord Ashley Home Office inspection in his first Factory Act. Lord Ashley was not in favour of it. But enforcement is now recognised as absolutely necessary for the working of similar clauses to those which are in this Bill. The statement the other day in regard to the Government Bill was not very clear upon this point of inspection. The language was very strong, and very satisfactory. But there seemed to be some sort of dual control. Of course, there are cases of dual control; of Home and Consular control, and that which is worked by the Board of Trade and Foreign Office; but, of course, that is not to be recommended in this case, and the Bill is rather optional on that point. The rival Bill leaves it very much to the Government to formulate a scheme, and I imagine that is a detail which is bound to be hammered out in Committee. We must regard this and other matters as details, vital details, and essential to the Bill after the principle has been adopted by us and by the Government. White List treatment is a philanthropic ladies' failure, although La Ligue des Acheteurs, and a similar institution under Royal patronage at Berlin, have done good in other ways—namely, by research. Inspection itself is declared by the Government, as by us, to be essential. There are obvious difficulties if the factory inspectors under the Home Office and a new class of inspectors under a different Department go into the same places to visit the same people. They are visited already by factory inspectors in respect of particulars and of Truck. This Bill is known and understood, and has received all but universal support. Its principle is contained in the Government Bill and announced as forming an essential part of that measure. My hon. Friend the Member for Barnard Castle will tell the House how far he thinks it necessary to keep the Bill alive, and the many Friends of the Bill represented by the right hon. Gentlemen on the Conservative Front Bench will also state their opinion on this point. I understand that the Government fully accept our view, though it may be that the provisions of their Bill are far from clear. Therefore, so far as I am concerned, I think we ought to accept the view of the House as shown in the debate to-day whether we ought to keep our Bill alive as a rival Bill so far as we can. We are, however, in regard to this Bill in the hands of the House. I have stated frankly our view, which corresponds very closely with that of the hon. Member opposite, but we have had no opportunity of discussing the matter with him, though we have come to the same conclusion, generally speaking. I support the second reading of the Bill without any desire to press it obstinately on the House, but with perfect readiness, if that should be the view of the House, to press it forward as a rival scheme. I beg to second the Motion.

We all recognise in every part of the House the evil that is to be dealt with by the measure now before us. On that point there can be no doubt. We have, all of us, a recollection of the most interesting debate which took place in this House last year on this Bill, as a result of which the measure was read a second time without a division. Full sympathy with those directly concerned exists, therefore, in every part of the House. When I put the motion on the Order, which I now rise to move, namely: "That it is inexpedient to proceed with the second reading of the Bill, in view of the intention of the Government, as expressed in the gracious Speech from the Throne, to introduce a Bill providing for the establishment of trade boards"—I had no idea at all that the right hon. Gentleman the President of the Board of Trade would bring in his Bill on such an early occasion. Now, we have had the advantage, not merely of the explanatory speech, but also of the text of the Bill itself, and what some of us feel with reference both to that Bill and the one now before us, the Sweated Industries Bill, is that, while we all know that the measure is intended to apply to sweated industries, the existence of which all of us alike deplore, it contains within it no specific reference to sweated industries, nor is it confined to such. Under the Bill there unfortunately exists a great power of extension. While we all of us desire that the sweated industries contained in this Bill should be improved, we do not like those provisions in the Bill which practically give a blank cheque to the Home Secretary to extend its action and its provisions in any direction, in any district, in any trade, and at any time. I know quite well that the Home Secretary himself is not very seriously concerned in the Trade Boards Bill, which the President of the Board of Trade introduced, but we very much object to the provisions of that Bill, which place upon him the very serious responsibility of deciding from time to time what applications made to him should be entertained and facilitated. The Home Secretary said that that was a preposterous responsibility to place upon him, and rather suggested that life under such conditions would become a burden upon him. While that would be the case so far as he is concerned, I think it is clear that the position of various-trades which might be brought into touch with him under this Bill would be still more difficult. Of course, we all desire to see less and less of strikes and conflicts between employers and "employed in all the industries of the country. I am not at all clear that this power of application to the Home Secretary, given under the Bill, would not set up a very large amount of friction between employers and employed, or that the action of the right hon. Gentleman could be carried out to the mutual satisfaction of both parties. There will be a temptation to a very small group of employés in any particular industry or in any particular works to make applications to the Home Secretary on the terms contained in the Bill, and as soon as that came to the knowledge of their employers-there would be a suggestion of difficulty and conflict which probably otherwise would never have been heard of, and which would merely be set going by a small coterie of a very small section of employee in that particular industry, or in that particular set of works, who have moved in the matter. I notice that to-day we have a repetition of the inexperience of last year—namely, that in the speeches of the Mover and Seconder of the Bill, notably in the speech of the right hon. Member for the Forest of Dean, they did not deal so much with the Bill itself as with those portions of the subject upon which we are all of us entirely agreed and at one. It is that power of extension to which I referred a moment ago, to which some of us look with very grave suspicion. We notice that there are certain trades referred to in the Bill. The report of the Select Committee on Home Work recommended that other industries should also be included which were of a very similar nature. I notice the underclothing trade, the baby linen trade, and the machine made lace trade do not appear to be included in the schedule of the Bill.

As to the underclothing trade, which is known as the "white trade," in my evidence on behalf of the promoters of the Bill I said I thought we might have an opportunity of dealing with it alternatively to one of the other industries.

In that case I understand the course of the right hon. Gentleman to be that certain trades in the schedule may be removed and other trades substituted?

Yes.

I presume on the ground the right hon. Gentleman stated that these particular trades not included in the schedule will perhaps subsequently prove to be really more sweated than other trades in the schedule.

My evidence had regard not only to the amount of sweating which existed and which was introduced very much in the white trade and the baby linen trade, but my point was that we desired to make an experiment in circumstances which would give a fair trial.

I am not quite clear, in those circumstances, why the right hon. Gentleman and his friends did not insert in the schedule these particular trades because their case would have been made still clearer and stronger. I have no doubt that the right hon. Gentleman whose sympathy with this movement is far wider than that of many other hon. Gentlemen and right hon. Gentlemen in the House would be glad to see it extended to any trade.

No. I said in my evidence we want to try the experiment under favourable circumstances. As I am asked the question the schedule is the one change that was made in the Bill after the Guildhall Conference, and when it passed into the hands of hon. Members below the gangway opposite. I speak for them, I think, and say it is a tentative schedule. We are quite prepared to consider the Government schedule. I should be prepared to prefer their schedule to ours.

They do not want to hamper the experiment by spreading is over too many industries, and at the same time they do not want to express any opinion as to how far they want extension. And the right hon. Gentleman, when I gave him the opportunity to include some such statement, did not make any reference to it at all. This is a side of the subject on which many of us I think very naturally look with some degree of suspicion and some degree of misgiving. We are quite aware this experiment is being tried in Australia and New Zealand, and the experience of those colonies has undoubtedly been of very great value to themselves, and more especially to the Committee on Home Work. But I venture to point out that the conditions obtaining in those colonies is so entirely different to the condition which obtains here that really very little importance can be attached to the experiences of those colonies economically. To begin with in those colonies there is a great lack of female labour. That does not obtain here. Here the difficulty of course is that the supply of female labour is so great, especially in certain districts that there is great embarrassment in finding any sort of employment for them of an adequate character. Then in the colonies there is really no such thing existing as home work. Nearly all is done in factories, where it is easy to control, where abuses such as it is now proposed to deal with are very unlikely to arise.

There would be undoubtedly, as one result of this Bill, and also of the Trade Board Bill, a raising of the prices of the cost of the articles in the various trades scheduled. That would be certain to happen as the result of the rising of the rate of wages. While we all must desire to see the rate of wages increased, while we all recognise the rate of wages is inadequate, while we should like to see great improvement in the life and surroundings of those classes, yet we have at the same time to bear in mind the fact that we are not altogether occupying an independent position. The right hon. Gentleman the Member for the Forest of Dean a moment ago referred particularly to the export trade. I must say the export trade has not arisen in my own mind in reference to this subject. It is not so much the export trade with which one is concerned as the home consumption and the import trade. That is the point really where the shoe would pinch, because since we artificially raise the rate of wages we make it easy for those who give employment to industries of the kind under discussion to go to the market where labour is cheapest, and that undoubtedly is in foreign countries where the length of the day's work is greater; where in many cases the rate of wages is still lower than obtains even in those industries in this country. And the tendency would increasingly be to transfer to Continental countries some of them; some of those industries which now do, to some extent, relieve the stress and the sorrows and the trials of some groups of our population.

It becomes a question then whether if that demand for higher wages is carried out, whether it will not result in the disappearance of wages altogether in those industries. That is a side of the question we have to bear in mind. It is a risk that certainly will arise when, as the result of artificial legislation, wages in those industries are artificially raised. I should like to ask what would be the attitude of the Government and of the local authorities on this subject. Both the Government themselves and the local authorities purchase articles produced in those various trades. Now will the Government and the local authorities, when they find that as a result of this Bill and of the right hon. Gentleman's Bill—the Trade Boards Bill—the cost of those various articles has been increased, will they be willing to pay the enhanced price, on will they, as in the case of granite and other things that we have considered recently, will they go at once to the cheapest market and give the preference to the foreign producer, working under such conditions abroad, and in that way destroy what little there is left of benefit arising out of those industries to the class of persons engaged in them?

That is what we hope to have some information upon, because if that is to be the action of the Government and of local authorities under this Bill, then they merely squeeze the industries at one end without in any sense relieving the pressure of foreign competition at the other. If it is really intended to destroy those industries then we ought to be told so frankly at once. If it is the intention to improve the conditions under which this work is carried on, then, it seems to me, that it is not necessarily only at one end to squeeze up by the organisation proposed in this Bill or in the Bill of the right hon. Gentleman, but it is necessary at the same time to ensure that the result of the squeezing shall not be to squeeze out of existence altogether.

If the Government is prepared to ensure that there shall be no undue, no unjust, no improper competition from abroad in the production of those commodities, then I think our position, the position of those trades, would be very much improved by the provisions of this Bill. If they are not prepared to do that it seems to me that the time will shortly come in those industries scheduled when the materials will be sent abroad, there to be made up under still more sweated conditions of foreign work, I and imported under the present unfortunate fiscal arrangements of this country into this country to wipe out altogether the industries to which we are now referring. Or worse still, not only would the, materials be sent abroad, and the finished articles imported into this country free of duty from persons who contribute nothing to the rates and taxes which those producing the articles in this country have to pay, and who, therefore, would be receiving under our fiscal system preferential treatment, but the materials themselves would be produced abroad, made up abroad, and the finished article sent here, to make our position still worse in regard to these industries. Then there is another side of this question which is of great importance. The sweated condition of these industries arises largely from the free importation of alien labour. If the hon. Member would go to Stepney and see the 50,000 or 60,000 foreigners living and working there under conditions to which he would never consent in the case of an Englishman—and, thank God, Englishmen will not do it—he would agree with me that the time has come when the comparatively free import of alien labour should come to an end If the present restriction on the incoming of aliens remains as it is, the difficulty is such that it is like trying to make an empty sack stand upright. We must have other restrictions on the import of alien labour, or, as I hope we shall have before long, the power of restricting the import of competing articles which are the result of sweated labour abroad, or else many of the provisions of this Bill and of the Trade Boards Bill, if they are not dead letters, will absolutely wipe out the modicum of wage-earning power which these industries at present place at the disposal of our people. Under this Bill evasion would be easy, and would probably become pretty general. If that is to be prevented an enormous army of inspectors would be required, involving great expense. I do not for a moment say that the money might not be thoroughly well invested if efficient means were taken to ensure a satisfactory result, but under our present fiscal system it can easily be shown that the arrangements of the Bill cannot be satisfactory so far as the workers are concerned. These industries at present do to some extent relieve a great deal of suffering from poverty. In many homes in the East End and other districts where home work is carried on, there are large numbers of women, either widows or the wives of men temporarily out of employment or permanently incapacitated, who eke out as a result of these industries a measure of comfort and sustenance which they otherwise would not have. It is a very low class of labour, unskilled—as "The Times" pointed out this morning, a great deal of the labour is what a child in a kindergarten school could learn—and naturally it is very low paid. But if this Bill wipes out these industries there will be in a large number of homes an increase of suffering, a lessening of the weekly income, and a larger lack of the comforts of life. I should like to refer to a summary of Mr. Aves' report with regard to his experience and observations on this subject in Australia and New Zealand. He says:— Of course, I know quite well that hon. Members below the Gangway will at this time of day say they do not want them; but we know quite well that when the power is set going the hon. Gentlemen below the Gangway, who are not conspicuous in being easily satisfied on this particular matter or any other matter, would both here in this House and in the country urge the President of the Board of Trade to endeavour to extend to the utmost limit the principles which underlie the Trade Boards Bill. These principles in some measure appear in the Bill now before us. The Bill itself constitutes not the President of the Board of Trade the dictator, but the Home Secretary; but I would point out that the dictatorship is one which the right hon. Gentleman the Home Secretary is extremely loath to take upon himself. The Bill constitutes definite interference with the freedom of contract. In the majority of trades at the present time workpeople are well able to take care of themselves. They are for the most part well organised; and I do not know that in the Trade Boards Bill it is proposed to exempt organised trades from those trade boards. I should also like to refer to the fact that there were other provisions brought to the notice of the Select Committee which are not dealt with in the Bill, and which I think ought to form an integral part of any measure dealing with this most difficult and complicated problem. There is the question of the delivery and the collection of work. Underlying that there is undoubtedly a great deal of abuse at the present time. People working under sweated conditions for very inadequate payment are obliged to leave their homes and their work and go considerable distances in order to deliver goods where employment obtains, and then when they arrive at the place of business of their employer there is no doubt they are very often kept a long period waiting before they receive the wages that are their due and have an opportunity once more of returning home to resume their occupation. Then there is no suggestion under the Bill for the registration of workmen. I do not know how the local authorities who have to deal with this matter can deal with it efficiently unless some provision is made for the registration of workers, so that their homes and the conditions under which they are at present engaged in the work can be known. Nor is there any proposal for the extension of the Public Health Act to carry out improvement in the sanitary condition of the homes where the work is done. That is a most important thing to have regard to. In fact, that perhaps, from the national point of view, is almost the most important of all; because, one result of these sweated industries undoubtedly is that the national physique of the children brought up in these homes is constantly liable to some deterioration. Some provision relating thereto clearly ought to be included in the Bill if it is to be considered at all a complete measure. Then there is no proposal with regard to the Truck Act. For these reasons, and for others which I might easily bring before the House, I beg to move the Motion which stands in my name, for I believe the House will be ill-advised to proceed further with the Bill, especially as we have before us the comprehensive measure of the right hon. Gentleman, the provisions of which, I fear, will lead to the very greatest amount of controversy in this House. I beg to move: "That it is inexpedient to proceed with the second reading of the Bill, in view of the intention of the Government, as expressed in the gracious Speech from the Throne, to introduce a Bill providing for the establishment of trade boards."

The Amendment which the hon. Member has proposed is hardly in accordance with the facts of the case. The Amendment refers to an intention of the Government. That intention of the Government has already been carried out. As the Amendment stands, it would be misleading if adopted by the House. If the hon. Member will alter the terms so as to make it in accordance with the facts, he can move it.

Might I move it in the form of a recommendation, Mr. Speaker?

The hon. Member can move it in this form: "That it is inexpedient to proceed with the second reading of the Bill, in view of the introduction by the Government of a Bill providing for the establishment of Trade Boards."

Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker, I should like to move the Amendment in that form.

Question proposed, "That the words proposed to be left out stand part of the Question."

I should like to second the Motion of my hon. Friend, and to acknowledge the moderate views he has expressed in regard to this Bill. I had myself a Motion on the Paper that the Bill be read a second time upon this day six months. I cannot help thinking that the bringing in of this Bill to-day is somewhat of a waste of Parliamentary time. The right hon. Gentleman and his friends opposite have already forestalled the Bill before us, and I should have thought that there was no object in wasting the time of the House in dealing with this. The Bill is not a new one. It passed through the Committee stage in 1907 and 1908, and I think, if we take the trouble to examine the evidence before the Committees, the doubt is bound to arise in our minds whether the remedy proposed will either cure, or even ameliorate, the evils in their worst form. The provisions of the Bill certainly constitute a new departure. It is, to my mind, a very great step in industrial legislation, and I do not think we can disguise from ourselves that if we pass this Bill into law it will have far-reaching consequences—more far-reaching than some even contemplate. It is a new departure in this sense—that it establishes for the first time a direct interference by the State in fixing the rate of wages. That is a system which up to the present moment has not been brought in—a system which I do not really believe is in accordance with the wishes of hon. Members in this House, except a few of those who sit below the Gangway. The question of State interference is a very large question indeed. We know very well there are Gentlemen below the Gangway who are of opinion that the State should interfere in every single measure with regard to the working population of this country. I have never taken that view, and I do not agree with it. I go so far as to say that if by State interference these evils could be removed, or in some measure mitigated, I should not oppose the measure. On the contrary, I should support the measure if I thought it would have that effect. The reason given for the establishment of wages boards under this Bill is that home workers are so unorganised and so poor that they are quite incapable of taking care of themselves. Before this step is taken I think, perhaps, it would be advisable that a first step should be taken to ascertain what are the causes of the poverty of those various workers. I think the first cause is the low wages which are paid in those industries. The question we have to consider is whether wages boards, if established, would prevent sweating. No one for a moment will deny that wages in home industries are very low indeed, and that the emoluments received for the labour expended is also very small, but I do not think there is any one in this House who will go so far as to say that the employer in these cases is deriving huge profits, or, rather, undue profits, by exploiting the labour of those who are engaged under the sweating system. I believe that the root of the evil is to be found in a fact that the employer in these cases resorts to sweating to escape the obligations imposed upon him by the various methods of labour organisations at the present moment, and I think also that these difficulties can be directly attributed to the Factory Acts, and also the Workmen's Compensation Act. In most of the industries where the sweating system is in vogue they are occupations where labour is of a temporary and seasonal character, and consequently it is impossible for an employer who only derives a small profit to himself to incur the greater expenditure imposed by the various Acts to which I have referred. But there is also the question of machinery, and we know perfectly well that the tendency of the establishment of the efficient machinery in factories is to cause a very large amount of competition with the home worker, and it is necessary under these circumstances that the wages of the home worker must fall, and in some industries this is also directly attributable to the same causes. If wages are to be kept up to a certain minimum, it will mean the extinction of the home worker, who in many instances are old men and women. I am convinced that no wages board could fix an adequate rate of remuneration and at the same time ensure a supply of work in competition with factories. This is a question naturally which touches at once the question of unemployment, for if a small subsistence is denied to a great many of these workers it is obvious that they must go and swell the ranks of the unemployed. I have always held the idea that there might be a system established of graduated wages; I believe if a system of graduated wages could be established in this country it would go far to remove the grievance of unemployment which now confronts us, and which in the past we have seen so rife in this country. What are the reasons of the low wages which exist now in some of these industries? I suppose the chief reason is that the work is of an unskilled character, or, on the other hand, that efficiency and knowledge in the various trades are quickly acquired. If we take, for example, one particular industry, that of sewing, we know perfectly well that it occupies a most important place in home work in this country. It is a form of work which is acquired in a large or small degree by all women, and, naturally, there is always a large supply of that class of labour, and, consequently, that keeps down the price of the labour. The character of those engaged in the labour also to a large extent tends to keep down the price. Who are the individuals who are engaged in the labour which is carried on under sweating conditions? There are those who engage in the labour for the purpose of augmenting the family income, whatever that may be; there are some who engage in industries of this kind for the purpose of having a little pocket-money; there are others who live with people who are old or infirm, and who have to stay at home for the purpose of looking after some invalid in their family; and there are also some who, because the regular wage-earner is for the moment temporarily unemployed, engage in home work. It is obvious that if by the introduction of a measure of this kind drastic restrictions are brought about there will be a great many evasions of the Act, and if there are evasions, it will consequently become a dead letter. These classes are less disposed to have regard to the rate of wages than the regular worker, and it is also very significant in regard to the workers engaged in sweated industries that trade unions have failed to overtake them and establish a foothold among them. The question I wish to ask is, if trade unions have already failed, how can it be asserted that a wages board would succeed?

On the wages board there are, I believe, to be representatives of the workers, and the manner of the choice of these representatives is to be left to the Secretary of State. This means organisation, and if so much organisation can be brought about I cannot understand why it is not possible for those workers engaged in these industries to establish, as has been done in other industries, a proper rate of wages. If the manner of the appointment is to be left to the Secretary of State, it appears to me that the greatest possible difficulty will lie upon the Secretary of State in framing a system of election which will be thoroughly satisfactory to the workers, and he will have to fall back on the alternative provided for by the Bill of nominating the representatives of the workers himself. If he does so, it is obvious that we must run the risk that the selection he makes will not be of a properly representative character. It is obvious, further, that if the representatives so nominated for these boards are not of a thoroughly representative character, it will be obsolutely impossible to enforce the provisions of this Bill. With regard to the question of evasion I think that this perhaps is one of the most important points to which any promoter of the Bill should seriously devote his attention. Evasion, I am convinced, in unorganised trades will be very easy. The employers are small. They have no capital, and perhaps no premises. The employer of to-day may be the workman of to-morrow; and the question I ask is how it is possible for the wages board to control employers of this description? The workers are of a very fluctuating character, and a great many are of a temporary character. These workers are too poor and too desirous of obtaining immediate recompense to trouble about the exact rate of wages.

With regard to this wages board, just so much as it is needed in a particular industry where the wages are low, it appears to me all the more easier for that industry to be able to defy organisation, while the workers will be too apathetic to make this innovation a success. Then there is the question of cost, and I hope we shall hear something from the Treasury Bench on this question. Where the wages boards are most needed there the difficulties will be the most owing to the very large additional staff that will be required. Many more factory inspectors will be required to prevent evasion, and to see that the decisions of the wages boards are carried out. Has this cost been estimated, and has the cost been contemplated if the Bill is extended so as to cover all home industries? With regard to the Select Committee of 1908, its Report was not of a convincing character. I do not think that Select Committee went further than the suggestion that legislation should be of a tentative and experimental character. It is also open to doubt whether legislation can extend beyond the more stable industries—where it is most needed.

With regard to the evils of sweating, they are of so terrible a character that it ill becomes anyone to oppose legislation even though not completely convinced of the likelihood of success. These two Bills—that is, the Bill which we are now discussing, and the one brought in the day before yesterday by the President of the Board of Trade—are almost worse than useless. The true remedy for sweating lies in public opinion. It lies in the determination of every individual to make up his mind not to take advantage of cheapness in those industries which are carried on under the sweating system. At the present moment the buying of things in the cheapest market is the watchword of every hon. Gentleman opposite, while, on the other hand, they are doing everything to make the conditions of labour impossible. It is for this reason I beg to second the Amendment.

I have no intention of following the Noble Lord or any other speaker in a general objection to legislation of this kind The Noble Lord's objections struck me to be of a somewhat belated character. Anyone who has read the speeches delivered against factory legislation and subsequent social legislation years ago—against legislation which tended to improve the lot of the workers—must be struck by the similarity of the objections which are now uttered to the objections of those days. We were told years ago that every step taken was taken in the wrong direction, that British industries and all other industries would suffer, and amongst other things it was asked, "What about the cost of these reforms?" "Are you sure they will be effective?" And then, worst of all, "You are doing away with that great thing, freedom of contract." I do not intend to enter into the general question. I intend to support the Bill, particularly on the ground that it contains the second clause. I am perfectly aware that the promoters of this legislation, amongst whom we ought not to forget that the right hon. Gentleman the Member for the Forest of Dean is foremost, have, no doubt, in their minds the case chiefly of women workers. They are all unorganised and many of them unskilled workers in various occupations and trades. No doubt enough is known as to the enormities that have been perpetrated in the course of these trades, but just legislation, if it cannot be adopted to other trades, may be applied to theirs. I therefore support the principle of the Bill, the provisions of which ought to be applied to such trades as are mentioned in the Bill. I must utter one word of caution in respect of this matter. The conditions of labour in Ireland and Great Britain are not quite .the same and some greater precautions will have to be applied in working out an Act of this kind in Ireland than would be necessary in Great Britain. However, I leave that part of the subject, because my principle object in rising is to emphasise the necessity for the second clause of the Bill. The second clause enables additional trades to be scheduled, and I have no doubt whatever that any Government that may be in power will avail themselves of such enactment if it should turn out that the experiments made with the scheduled trades had been successful. It may seem somewhat incongruous in this connection to refer to another species of employment. The employment which is chiefly in my mind is that of the skilled and the unskilled workers in the employment of the Irish railways, and it seems to me to be a perfectly cognate subject, and one that must be dealt with at no distant date, either by legislation of this kind or by some analogous legislation. I will not trouble the House by going into statistics upon the subject, but I have here an account of the wages paid by one of the greatest of the Irish railway companies at their works at Inchicore, in the county of Dublin, which I represent, and I must say I myself was astonished at the facts which it disclosed. I had no idea, though I lived near the place, that the wages were of such a starvation character. It is an urban district, rents are pretty high generally, but the rents which these workers pay are paid for dwellings oftentimes of the most wretched character, and it seems to be a perfect outrage on humanity and civilisation that for the purpose of keeping up dividends the wages paid to these workers, some of them skilled and others unskilled, should on an average only be 15s. a week in such a district, and that some of them should be as low as 12s., and even 9s., a week. The chairman of the Great Southern and Western Company, upon whom I do not want to make any attack at all, poses as somewhat of a philanthropist, and a short time ago he attended a meeting in Dublin convened for the purpose of fighting the evil of tuberculosis. Well, one of the causes of tuberculosis if not the chief cause, is to be found in the wretched dwellings of the workers in towns, dwellings in which there is not proper ventilation and in which life cannot but deteriorate even if the wages are good. Is it not somewhat of a mockery for this gentleman to attend a meeting like that to declaim against a condition in which the poor live and yet to be a party, and, I suppose, a chief party, to compelling these workmen to work for such wages as 15s. and 9s. a week? It may be said with regard to railway workers that a year and a half ago or more an expedient was tried in the shape of conciliation boards, which were intended to have the effect, I suppose, which this Bill would have in the case of the scheduled trades and other trades that may be liable. But as far as I can understand, whatever the case may be as regards Great Britain, the conciliation boards, as far as I can learn, have not worked in Ireland, and, as a matter of fact, I am informed that every sort of device is resorted to for the purpose of preventing the formation and establishment of these conciliation boards in Ireland. If that be the case—I do not vouch for it—it is perfectly clear that something else than voluntary action on the part of the State is necessary. The State must not confine itself to mere voluntary effort if it be found that conciliation boards such as were so successful in the case of one great railway in Scotland fail in Ireland. I for one regret the necessity for this legislation as much as anybody can, because I am not a Socialist, and I have no sympathy with what I used to understand were the general aims of Socialism. But when I find women and men—young men and old men—working under conditions which are a disgrace to humanity, under which they cannot get proper food and clothing and education for their children, under which they cannot provide decent habitations for themselves, under which an undue proportion of them fade away out of life before their time, under the effect of tuberculosis brought on by conditions in which they work and live, I do not think any legislation would be too severe to put an end to such a state of things as that. All these objections about cost and the sacredness of the freedom of contracts, the impossibility of carrying these things out have all been heard before and have been refuted by events, and at the present day I am informed that in at least one of the British Colonies—Victoria—this system is in force and is applied to many trades every year, and I am also informed that it is being applied in South Australia. There is no use talking about the impossibility of carrying these matters and predicting disastrous consequences, when we find the Colonies carry them out. [An HON. MEMBER: "They have Protection."] Someone says they have Protection, and that it is carried out under a Protection. I do not believe one bit of that. Are we to understand that this Bill would, in fact, be a consequence of Protection? Then I might possibly change my mind, but I am afraid a great many of the Constituents of the hon. Member who says "Yes," will be surprised, particularly the great employers of labour whom he represents, and who do not want this Bill either under Protection or Free Trade. Practically the same system exists in France, and it is nonsense to retail, for the thousandth time, all those arguments which were used for the first time when the late Lord Shaftesbury introduced his first factory legislation, and which have been repeatedly used on the production of every piece of such legislation during the last half century. I say it is absolutely absurd to talk of all these belated arguments at the present day. I support the second reading of this Bill, and I hope it will pass into law, as it will improve the particular employment to the conditions of which I have ventured to call the attention of the House.

The debate to-day is a most encouraging indication as to the unanimity of opinion in this House on the desirability of something being done to mitigate, if possible, the evils of sweating. It is, I think, not insignificant, that this very Bill which this House is considering to-day, has in three successive years been introduced by representatives of three distinct parties in the House. Three years ago I had the honour of taking over the Bill from my right hon. Friend the Member for the Forest of Dean, and I had the honour of introducing it. Last year the Member for Bury was successful in the ballot, and in his case he secured a practically unanimous second reading. To-day we have the Bill brought again to this side of the House, and introduced by my hon. Friend the Member for Durham. I think it is marvellous that we have such a coincidence, and, as I have said, I think it is a very striking indication, not only of the development of opinion inside the House, but a very accurate representation of the development of public opinion outside the House. Another thing is, that I think the debate so far as it has gone to day, demonstrates that no serious attempt has as yet been made to make out any case against the Bill.

We have had no opportunity yet.

I have in my mind my hon. Friend, and no doubt he will express his opinion. It is quite true that the hon. Member for St. Albans did in his speech, I think in a very doleful tone, bring before the House what he thought might be some of the consequences, if either this measure, or the measure for which the Government have made themselves responsible, should pass into law. One of the chief objections I noted in the speech of the hon. Member for St. Albans is that he is terribly afraid of the powers contained in both these Bills, if portions of the Bills are extended to other trades not included in the Schedule. I think, if I recollect rightly, he went on to say that it might be the instrument of a good deal of friction between employers and employés in trades that are to-day working with the greatest harmony. I do not understand, however, that there will be any general extension of the application of the principle of either of these Bills. I am not going so far as to say that organised labour, as such, does not desire these Bills—I do not wish to be misunderstood, but I want to make it perfectly clear that they do not desire these Bills, or the law which would obtain on their passing, in order that they may use the powers conferred for the organised trades themselves. Organised labour, and I rejoice at it—organised labour is daily learning to recognise the value of conciliation and arbitration. There is a tendency—a most encouraging tendency—on the part of even our most highly organised trades, to apply this principle of conciliation, but they desire to apply it altogether on the voluntary principle. I have the honour myself—and this, I think, to some extent illustrates the point that I am dwelling upon—I have the honour myself to be the vice-chairman of a conciliation board covering the whole of Lancashire, which, I think, includes in its operations some 50 employers and some 7,000 workmen. I have also the honour of being the vice-chairman of a board covering the whole of the North-East Coast, and including some 30 firms and some 3,000 workers. One of these boards was created in the year 1894; the other is a much more recent creation. Both these boards work entirely on the voluntary principle, and it is the voluntary principle of conciliation and arbitration that appeals most strongly to organised labour. But may I point out to those who have spoken against the Bill, or will speak probably against both these Bilis to-day—may I point out to them that we are attempting to deal with the class of worker, and especially women workers, who, all experience goes to demonstrate, are absolutely helpless to assist themselves, and it is because their inability was so very clearly demonstrated by the great majority of the witnesses that gave evidence last year before the Committee on which I had the honour of sitting, that we felt it was essential that the State should come and assist them out of their very serious trouble. Another point that my hon. Friend made against the Bill was, the danger of its exercising most injurious effects upon certain trades—the trades of course to which it applied. I think he talked about almost squeezing some of those trades out of existence. As I listened to that speech it struck me that there was one point entirely absent from his mind in considering this subject. He seemed to forget that the primary value that will be derived from the operation of these Bills is, that they will bring the worst employers in particular trades up to the recognised market level that is observed by the best employers in those trades. I think in this discussion this point has not been sufficiently kept in mind. There is not a trade scheduled in our Bill, or scheduled or referred to in the Bill of the Government; there is not a trade but what on examination it will be found that there is the greatest disparity in the wages and prices paid for exactly the same article, though if an investigation was held it would probably be found that the article was going into the same market, into the same particular class of shop, and, probably, notwithstanding the tremendous disparity in the wage or price paid for making the article, exactly the same price, or pretty well the same price, was being charged in the sale market for that particular article. I want my friends here to recognise that in those boards those who stand next to the sweated workers to gain an advantage, and a legitimate advantage, are what we term the best employers in the particular trades to which the boards are intended to apply. The witnesses before the Committee demonstrated very clearly that that was one of the hopeful things which would come out of the operation of this board, namely, the protection of the good employer against the unscrupulous sweating employers who have been the means of bringing this evil into such prominence. My. hon. Friend spoke of it raising wages. We hope it will raise wages. What is the use of the board? I think all the sweated exhibitions which have been held in different parts of the country have proved that the prices and wages paid for certain articles which are largely produced by home workers are scandalous to our present civilisation.

I am sorry to interrupt, but in the passage to which he refers it was not that I in any way did not desire to increase wages—far from it. What I pointed out was the result which would naturally arise from an increase in wages. I over and over again stated I hoped the condition of things might be very much improved.

I did not wish to give the House anything but a fair and accurate interpretation of the remarks of my hon. Friend, and I did not wish to suggest that he was against an increase of wages or prices. It is true he was dealing with the corollary which would subsequently follow, but the point I wish to make is that all the evidence which has been taken on this subject proves that it is absolutely essential, unless we are going to have all the serious consequences which we know are absolutely inseparable from the sweating system, and especially the sweated work which is done in connection with homes, that wages and prices should be raised in order that the standard of life for tens of thousands of our workers which are shamefully low to-day, may be improved. So long as we can show, and I think I have shown, that the first, and, in my judgment, the most important effect will be that those wages will not be raised above the market value—they will be raised up, in the case of the more unscrupulous employer, to the level of the good employer—we ought to welcome the Bill.

I admit freely that the Bill introduced' by the President of the Board of Trade includes our Bill. I welcome the fact that the Government has seen its way to include all the main propositions that we are endeavouring to set up in our measure. I am glad the Government Bill even goes beyond our own in one or two important particulars, and the word of criticism that I have to offer is that, whilst it attempts more, it runs the risk of securing for the workers less. The Bill of the Government is more of a permissive character, and it confers upon the Board of Trade a surprising amount of power. I am not quite sure whether I would not have been satisfied with less provided that the Bill made it quite clear that that less was made absolutely secure. It seems to me that if we admit, and I think no one has attempted to challenge the point, that the evil of sweating is so great and the evils arising out of those evils need no longer be enumerated, as they are common knowledge, if the demand for proposals, whatever they may be, has become so universal that there is a consensus of opinion that the State should come to close grips with this problem, it is most important that the Government ought to have gone as far as to say: "We will set up boards in the trades that we have included in our Bill." In clause one of our Bill we say:—

I come back to the point that I wish the Government had seen its way, even if it had attempted less, to make that which it attempted absolutely definite and conclusive.

This is borne out not only by the evidence that was given before the Committee, but also by the experience of Victoria. In Victoria there are existing today some 40 separate wages boards, which already include some two-thirds of the total workers of the Colony. The Rev. John Wilson, who was the late president of the Anti-Sweating League of Victoria, has said that "the benefits of the system' were shown by its continuous extension; by the approval"—and on this point may I appeal to my hon. Friends who moved and seconded the Motion against the second reading of the Bill—"of the leading employers; by the steady increase in the average of wages; by a similar increase in the wages of females, especially the ones who were sweated; by an increase in the wages paid by contractors where you have no sweated rates, 16s. to 20s. being now the minimum where good workers in 1890 to 1895 earned only from 5s. to 8s. per week; and by the contrast between the rates in regulated trades and those still outside the Act." May I also say that this gentleman makes the very important statement that out of 39 boards in Victoria only one of them has really failed. Surely this is the most conclusive evidence that the Government would have done well to declare more emphatically that it was their intention immediately to set up these boards, and if they had done so I have no hesitation in saying all its friends, both in this House and in the country—and in this I believe I have the concurrence of the right hon. Baronet the Member for the Forest of Dean—were prepared to abandon straight away our own Bill and to accept that for which the Government has made itself responsible; and I hope that if not to-day, then during the second reading, we shall have an assurance that the principle of their own Bill shall be immediately applied to the trades that are left in their schedule, whatever they may be; and with this reservation may I say that I sincerely trust that the Government Bill will during this Session become the law of the land.

There seems to have been a feeling at the beginning of this debate that in view of the fact that the Government Bill was introduced on Wednesday last it was more or less a waste of time to discuss this Bill, but I think that we owe a great debt of gratitude to the hon. member for Durham for introducing it. It certainly has had the effect of hastening the progress of the Government in the matter.

Does my hon. Friend suggest that we could have moved more quickly in the matter?

I think most Governments might have taken up the matter long before this. Another point in favour of my hon. Friend's Bill is that it will have a very useful effect in making the pace for the Government Bill, and I feel, no doubt, that this Bill will be kept alive and used for that purpose. The right hon. baronet the Member for the Forest of Dean seemed to me to minimise the points of difference between the two Bills, and to treat them as if they were scarcely worth discussion—

If I may refer to the concluding words of the hon. Gentleman opposite, who has just finished speaking, I may say that I agree with them entirely. My mind may have worked a little in advance of the point that we have reached, and I may have come to the conclusion which my hon. Friend opposite has apparently come to from his last words, that the Government mean to do what he has suggested.

There is one point I regret not to see embodied in either of the Bills, and that is one of the recommendations of the Home Workers Committee for the registration of home workers. I do not know whether it would be possible to embody that proposal in either of these Bills, but I attach considerable importance to it, and I should have liked to see some attempt made to carry it out. There is one very distinct difference between the two Bills with regard to the rate of wages. In the Government Bill the wages may be fixed at either a minimum time rate or at a minimum piece rate. There is no restriction as to the way in which the rate may be fixed. But a minimum time rate cannot be fixed for home workers and a minimum piece rate cannot be fixed for factory workers.

Is that suggested?

I think it is impossible under the Bill to fix a minimum time rate for home workers. One of the recommendations of the Home Workers Com- mittee, with which I entirely disagree, is that they should be empowered to fix a minimum time rate for home workers. It is a matter of impossibility. You have got to find out what the average worker is. That, in itself, is a very difficult thing. How would an hon. Member ascertain what an average Member of Parliament is, what he could do, and how long he could speak? It is just as difficult to find out what the average home worker is, how much he could do, and how he ought to do it. I should, therefore, prefer the wording of the Bill of my hon. Friend, because it leaves out the idea of being able to fix a minimum time rate for home workers. I agree with the criticisms of my hon. Friend the Member for Barnard Castle as to the tentative character of the Government Bill. It is certainly too tentative, too dilatory, and also too official. I should have much preferred to see rather less in the bands of the officials of the Board of Trade. I do not like to see too much power given to administrative departments in that way. It might often happen that, owing to the different view of those responsible for the conduct of affairs in the Board of Trade very different decisions might be arrived at one time or another. I think a great deal of difficulty might arise. I should prefer to see more freedom given to the board from the rather heavy weight of officialdom which is to be placed upon it.

I confess I have no very extravagant hope as to the great benefit which will arise to the workers from this measure either one way or another. But I welcome it as an experiment. I am perfectly convinced, and have been for some time, that the experiment should be tried. If successful, no one will welcome it more heartily than I will, but I may say that I have not at present very high hopes that it will entirely do away, or do away to any extent, with the evils we are trying to remove. It has been stated by the hon. Member for Barnard Castle that the whole object of this measure was to raise wages. I was very glad to hear his objection to the idea that it was always necessary to buy in the cheapest market, and so on. In any trades where the employer or middleman is getting more than his proper share of profits, and the workers are getting less, I think in a case like that it is possible that the wages may be raised by the operation of the board, and so bring, as the hon. Member who has just spoken said, the bad employers up to the level of the good ones. But I do not think any- one who read the evidence of our Committee upon Home Work—I dare say a good deal more evidence might have been called—could have failed to see that there was no very great proof of excessive profits accruing to the employers, and that the cause of these lower rates of wages really rested more in the competition between hand-work and machinery, in which handwork was always getting further and further behind, and also, to my mind, to a great extent in the competition with foreign countries in some of these trades. I know that there are some people who imagine that there are trades in the schedule of the Bill of my hon. Friend here which are not those which are subject to foreign competition to any great extent. I am not prepared to admit that myself. But whether they are or whether they are not, seeing that the Bill takes the power to extend the operations of the wages board to any other trade, it is a consideration which must be borne in mind by anyone interested in this Bill. I see the chairman of that committee is sitting opposite to me now. I am sure he would not contradict me when I say that he was not at all anxious to hear evidence on the subject of foreign competition. In fact, he regarded any questions which approached this question to be altogether out of order, and, as far as possible, very few questions were asked. No attempt was made to call witnesses with regard to foreign competition. I am sure he will agree with me that there was no attempt on the part of any member of the committee to elicit information on that subject, and that any attempt resulted in the Member being called to order, as we were thought to be getting rather—

The hon. Member did make a good many attempts.

Whatever attempts were made were stopped, as the hon. Member knows, and I think anyone who reads the report of the evidence will see that those attempts, just when they were beginning to get interesting, were very often nipped in the bud by the chairman. In spite of that, there were one or two bits of evidence—quite enough to my mind—to make it perfectly clear that, whatever one's views may be about this question, that foreign competition is a most important factor in this matter. I have two or three quotations here, but I will not trouble the House with them, although everyone, I think, must be aware that foreign competition is a most important factor that we have to consider in this connection. I think it is due to my Friend on my left to say that I am rather surprised to find that he has not in any way attempted to meet this question. How can you possibly raise the wages of people engaged in these trades, where there is foreign competition, if you do nothing to regulate the importation into this country of goods made under conditions which you stop here, but which you cannot stop abroad? Unless something of that sort is done, I believe that in nine-tenths of the cases of sweated industries you will make very little difference indeed by these wages boards. I do wish that those on both sides of the House who are interested in this question would for a moment look at the facts of the case. They could put the fiscal question out of their minds, and actually face the evidence that is before them, and other evidence that they could get, which to me proves conclusively that very little good can be done in any trade where there is any foreign competition unless you do something to check the importation of similar goods from abroad. I hope the hon. Member will keep this Bill alive. I prefer it of the two Bills. I would like to see them run side by side, and if the Government Bill goes forward, to see the best parts of my hon. Friend's Bill incorporated in it.

The hon. Gentleman who has just sat down said he was in favour of the Bill, but used the not specially strong argument that the measure would do no good to the people for whom it is supposed to be introduced.

I did not say no good.

"Little or no good."

I said it might do a little good.

I do not wish to misrepresent the hon. Gentleman, but he said, I understand, that the Bill would do a little or not much good to the workers. We are going to attempt to pass a Bill which, according to one of its own advocates, is going to do little or not much good to the workers, and we are going to alter the whole system on which the fabric of British trade has been built up, and upon which, up to the present time, it has been succesfully carried on. That being so, it would, I think, be a very serious course to take, and I trust that the kind heart and senti- ment and feeling of my hon. Friend will not weigh with the House of Commons to such a degree as to allow the principle of this Bill to become law. In the absence of the hon. Member for Barnard Castle, may I ask the hon. Member for Durham whether he agrees with the provision in the second clause, which provides for the extension to any trade of the provision that:—

"Application for the establishment of a wages board for any trade in any district may be made to the Secretary of State by any trade union or trades council which represents persons employed in the trade in the district or by any six persons who are either employers or workmen of labour or employed in the trade in the district."

Is this Bill to be extended to trades other than the small number of sweated trades I Why is the permission to be given?

This is an experimental Bill, and if it succeeds it may be extended to other trades.

The real fact of the matter is that this is an attempt to introduce by a side wind what the Socialist party and the Labour party have long desired, namely, the State regulation of wages in every trade of the United Kingdom. An hon. Member below the Gangway expressed the desire that the Bill should be extended to railway workers in Ireland, and according to his statement a particular railway company pays very low wages for the purpose of being able to pay a dividend. Apparently a dividend is a thing to be avoided in the opinion of the hon. Gentleman, and consequently he wishes the Bill to be extended to railways in Ireland in order that higher wages may be obtained by the railway workers in that country. That again goes to prove my statement that the real object of the Bill is to fix a minimum wage in all trades. The hon. Member for one of the Divisions of Dublin said that there are wages boards in operation in Australia. I believe there are, but they have been extremely unsuccessful. I am prepared to adduce reasons for that statement which I hope will convince the two hon. Members opposite.

Of course, no one regrets more than I do the harrowing details one occasionally sees reported in the newspapers of the case of some poor woman who receives Is. or 1s. 6d. a day, out of which she has to pay so much rent and meet other expenses, so that she cannot keep herself in a proper condition of life. While no one regrets such cases more than I do, the point I wish to make is this—that this kind of Bill will not alter those evils, but I believe will accentuate them. We know that there are a number of people who are physically unable to do more than a certain amount of work in a day, or because they are slow and lack skill. They may be able to do a certain class of work extremely well if they are given time; but if you pass a Bill of this kind you may affect the employment of such people, because it is not possible that the emlpoyer could pay them a higher rate of wages unless they could produce a larger amount of work. The consequence will be that the employer will only employ those who can do work quickly.

The hon. Baronet forgets that these trade boards would have power to make piece rates, and, therefore, the slower workwomen would be able to earn their living because the piece rates would operate.

I was not alluding at the moment to the piece rate. I presume if the piece work is varied in the direction which we all desire, namely to give a larger wage, the price of the piece work must be higher.

Quite.

It may be that it is not possible to pay that higher price and obtain a profit. I gather from what the hon. Member for Oswestry said that the margin of profit is not high at the present moment. While I admit that the interruption of the hon. Member was relevant, at the same time it must be remembered though a larger sum was paid for the piece work, the employer may say, "I cannot afford to pay a larger sum, therefore I must get men who will work quicker by day labour, and produce a larger amount than I can get by those smaller people to whom I have to pay a larger price for piece work." Supposing my contention is correct, the result of this Bill will be to add to the number of the unemployed. That, of course, is not for a moment what the hon. member for Durham or the hon. Member for Barnard Castle desired, but it is what all these things tend to do. If you attempt to interfere with the ordinary laws of nature, then I think the result will be that you will, instead of improving your conditions, injure them, and make them far worse than they were before.

The real origin of this Bill is that, as the trade unions have been able to make better bargains by what is called collective bargaining than the people not in the trade unions, then the State must be called in to assist the principle of collective bargaining, and some such Bill of this sort must be passed. Is that the abandonment of the principle of exchange which is of the essence of bargains?

Payment is not measured by the value of the work, but by the necessity of the work.

The bargaining is to be fixed not by exchange between employer and employed, or by what is advantageous to each, but by the pressure which the employer is able to put on the employed, and so obtain the work of the employed person at less.

Less than the value.

How can my hon. Friend make that out, as it has just been said that there is no great profit accruing to the employer? There cannot be less than the value, unless it is proved that a large profit is accruing to the employer. The Factory Acts only regulate the hours and conditions of the women and children working in the factories. They do not attempt to deal with wages. I believe that, except possibly in Victoria, in no civilised countries have States accepted in its entirety the view that exchange involved injustice and robbery, and that wages and occupation must be determined by other than what we may call market considerations. This Bill does away altogether with market considerations, and puts in fixed and arbitrary rates which, in my belief, will not be in any way effective.

There is always the question of foreign competition. The subject was dealt with by my hon. Friend the Member for Oswestry. I would like to point out to hon. Members below the Gangway that without some system of protection a Bill of this sort is absolutely ineffective. Suppose this Bill comes into operation, that a wages board is set up, and that either the price of the piece work or the wages is raised to a condition which enables the people to live in a healthy state what will be the result if the employer finds that he cannot sell the goods under those conditions? One of two things will result, either the business will cease, or he will obtain those goods elsewhere where those regulations do not exist. There is the third supposition that people in England will raise the prices of the articles which are on sale in order to enable the working person and the employer to get a profit. I do not believe that as a rule will take place, and it will not be advocated by hon. Gentlemen opposite, who say that the proper thing to do is to buy as cheaply as you can in the cheapest market. That being so, I cannot conceive how hon. Gentlemen below the Gangway could vote against the Bill of the hon. Member for Thanet a few days ago, which had for its object the introduction of a measure which would have assisted this particular proposal. I am told that many of the workmen employed in these trades view with great suspicion any attempt to deprive them of their already scanty earnings, as they know that legislation of this sort will really be detrimental to them. The hon. Member for Durham, when I stated that legislation of this sort, introduced in Victoria, had not been successful, said that that was not correct.

On the whole it has been successful, but the conditions are so entirely different that I do not think much can be drawn from the argument.

In Australia permits to work at wages below the minimum have been granted from the outset to aged and infirm workers. Is there any provision of that sort in this Bill?

Sub-section 3 of Section 5 provides for that.

The fact that that provision is in the Bill shows that its promoters contemplate that as soon it becomes law it will be necessary to make exceptions. If the Bill is to be successful at all it must have no limitations or exceptions. Once introduce a number of exceptions and you put an enormous power into the hands of a board, and personally I object very much to putting my livelihood or that of anybody else into the power of a board.

What about railway conciliation boards?

I was against conciliation boards, but it would be out of order for me to go into that question now. I should like to quote an extract from the "New Zealand Times" of 9th September last, which seems to show that both sides are eager to evade the Act.

same way. [An HON. MEMBER: "You must be a Socialist!"] No, no; not at all. It is where two people holding sincere and genuine views come to the same conclusion that you get evidence that must be right and their views ought to be carried out. I have endeavoured to show that though this. Bill from the sentimental point of view may meet with approval, the people who. really have the interest of these poor persons at heart are the people who have got the courage to get up and say that they believe these sentimental remedies are no remedies at all. I quite recognise that that is not an easy thing to do in this House. I do not often endeavour to obtain credit for myself, but I say credit is due to those people who hold the views I do and who believe sincerely that any artificial at tempts of this sort will only result in failure, and get up and give their views to the House and to the country. I hope myself that in a few years, by encouraging trade and fostering genuine employment, and by getting rid of hon. Gentlemen and right hon. Gentlemen opposite, we shall get a better state of things and that there will be better and genuine employment for the country.

The horn Baronet has been betrayed by a too kindly sympathy to have too great regard to the figure which has often made its appearance in this House, viz., the widow who, having to provide for herself and several children, is bound to do work "to help," as the hon. Baronet says, "to eke out the comforts of her miserable existence." There is nothing in the measure before the House that would threaten the livelihood of that poor widow, because she is, as in most cases of women workers, a piece worker, and, therefore, if she works slowly she will not be injured by this measure. She is not at all likely to lose her employment because of the measure, unless work is done which obviously ought not to be done by human fingers at all. There are trades of that character. One is match-box making. I have seen match-boxes made in the East End of London that would make people revolt at the thought of touching them. But that is a trade, so far as it is carried on by human fingers, should cease altogether. It would be good for society, good for the widows, and good for the children, that they should be driven out of that trade, and the work done by machinery, and that human fingers should cease to be employed at it at all. You can make match-boxes better and more cheaply by machinery than by employing the poor widow. If we are to have regard to the children and of the generation which is to follow that widow—and if we are to see that there shall be fewer of these uneconomic units, and fewer of these degraded units of society—we shall do our best with hard heads as well as soft hearts to get rid of these conditions. The hon. Baronet seemed to have some admiration for voluntary agreements with regard to the rates of wages. He seemed to be in entire sympathy with them. But the economic effect is the same whether or not the rate is arrived at by voluntary agreement or by such a trade board as this Bill seeks to enact. The economic effect is precisely the same on the price of the article. The only thing is that in one instance you have got units who are able to contend with employers, and in the other you have poor units of society unable to organise themselves, and unable to meet employers, and for whom such a measure as this or that of the President of the Board of Trade will provide the means of meeting the employer upon fair terms. Now I am appealing to the most hard-headed point of view in this matter. The whole argument for this measure, and for the, in some respects, similar measure of the right hon. Gentleman, is to get more efficiency of industry, more efficiency of labour, and, therefore, not higher, but lower prices. The lowest prices may be the result of the highest machinery attended by skilled labour that receives the highest wages. If it had not been for the work of the trade unions in the cotton trade, combined with the action of the State in enforcing the Factory Acts, the cotton masters would not have been so anxious to use machinery, and the cotton goods instead of being cheaper would have been dearer.

But what does the hon. Member propose to do with people who have been turned out of their employment by this efficient machinery?

The answer to that is very simple. The people to whom I have referred are a cost to the State. The present poor law arrangements are already more than half supporting these people. I remember one day investigating a large block of buildings in the East End of London in which the match box-making trade was carried on, and in each case more than half of the subsistence of the family was derived from the poor law authorities. Already the State is paying part of the wages of the employer in making match boxes. In so far as I admit that if machinery is substituted for human beings, undoubtedly you can drive some units out of the trade, but I should say that that would be for their own good, the good of their families, and the good of society in the long run. The hon. Baronet can only see the hardship suffered by the woman, and he cannot see the hardship caused to the children. A case comes to my mind of a house which I visited where the woman was engaged in matchbox making, and the children were tumbling about on the floor amongst the materials which she was using. These children are going to be the adults of the next generation in this country. The hon. Baronet is not having regard to that, but I do not suppose he has any desire to support a system which would perpetuate such conditions. If he is going to make his country strong, it is not to be done simply by having too great a regard for the preservation of the poor, miserable livelihood of such women. By supporting that system he would destroy the chances of the children. I have said enough on that point. What I was saying when the hon. Baronet interrupted me was that you get the very largest amount of cheapness through the use of the latest and best appliances and by the payment of high wages. If all that is true it entirely disposes of the hon. Baronet's argument with regard to foreign competition. If it is true that anything that makes for the better payment of labour produces more efficiency it must be true that the enactment of such a measure as that now before the House would neither weaken us in the export market nor make it more possible for the foreigner to compete in our home market. The greater the efficiency produced would make us stronger in the export market and also stronger at home.

I think we are indebted to the hon. Member for Durham, to the right hon. Baronet, the Member for the Forest of Dean, and the hon. Member for Berwick, who at different times in years gone by, when the solution of this question was not so generally accepted as it is now, have exerted themselves to bring the question into the arena of political discussion. We have certainly had a very interesting statement to-day by the hon. Member for Durham, who has come here at some personal risk to move his I measure, and I trust that he will not suffer in any way from his devotion to the cause which he has at heart I think that those Members who have exerted themselves in this cause ought to feel satisfied with the position the question has now reached. It has reached a position where the Government, with all the resources open to the Government, and with all the control over Parliamentary business which falls to the lot of the Government has definitely taken up and adopted their views and principles, and is seeking whole-heartedly to give the greatest possible measure of effect to them. I do not propose myself to deliver a speech upon the merits of this question. I think I will reserve what I have to say on the merits until I come to the second reading of my own Bill, but I do say that those Members who have laboured in the past on the subject, and those people outside of the House who take an interest in this question, may be and should be satisfied with the place which we have reached in this movement to-day. Here you have the principle of the question not greatly disputed. The hon. Baronet who has spoken on the subject challenges the principle of the Bill, but still, after all has been said and done, nobody seriously minimises the great arguments—the effective and logical arguments—which have been urged in favour of legislation of this kind. There is a strong balance of resolve on the part of the House, and, of all sections of the House, that an effort should be made to cope with the evils of sweating. No other view has animated the Government in approaching this question. We have studied it with a single-minded purpose, namely, of availing ourselves of all the information and of collecting all the information of those who have studied the question, and of formulating the most elastic, flexible, and varied machinery for dealing with the evils of taking all powers which are likely to be useful; and as we have been animated by that spirit in proposing legislation, so the Board of Trade, if Parliament should confer upon it such powers, will be animated by an equal spirit of earnestness and zeal in devising the legislation in such a way as to secure not merely the most striking expression of pious opinion, but of securing the greatest measure of practical results. That is all I have to say on the subject to-day. But I would like to offer one word of counsel as to what the House should do with the present Bill. I do not wish to discuss technical points of order, but it would certainly be an embarrassment to the future Government Bill if the present Bill were negatived, and it might conceivably be an embarrassment to the future Government Bill on technical grounds if the second reading of this Bill were affirmed. Therefore, I think, on the whole, if I may offer my advice, the most convenient course from all points of view, and especially from the point of view of the hon. Gentleman who moved the second reading of the measure would be when this debate has run its course—and no one has any wish to curtail the debate or to prevent hon. Members from expressing their views—we should adjourn the debate. That would leave the Bill of the hon. Member for Durham unprejudiced and unprejudged, and it would leave it still in the field in case anything should happen to the Government Bill, or if that Bill should not be found satisfactory, or if it should be found incapable of satisfying the different opinions which are held in the House, the hon. Member's Bill would still be alive, and it would still be there to step forward into the breach which would thus be opened up by the destruction of its comrade, though not, I trust, its rival. Therefore, I would venture to suggest to the hon. Gentleman that I think it would be for the general convenience of those who have this cause at heart, and I hope we may all work together without party distinction on the matter when there is a chance of doing something useful. If there is no party feeling in the matter I think the hon. Gentleman would assist the cause he has at heart and safeguard the interests and fortunes of his own Bill, if at this stage when the discussion has passed through the regular phase he would move, or assent to the moving, the adjournment of the debate. It would leave this issue unjudged, and it would give the Government the opportunity of putting their proposals in all their fulness and integrity before the House. It would enable Members in all parts of the House to discuss on the actual and concrete proposals of the Government what would be the best way of arriving at a good decision. The adoption of that course would still leave the solution which the hon. Member has proposed absolutely in the field and ready to be brought forward in the second line supposing anything should happen, which I certainly trust may not happen, to the course of Government legislation on this subject. That is the counsel which I respectfully convey to the House.

May I hope that under the circumstances which the right hon. Gentleman has just now recited he will be willing to recommend that the Motion which I have on the Paper be accepted. [Several HON. MEMBERS on the MINISTERIAL side: "No, no."] Of course, we shall not proceed with this.

I think that course might seem to indicate that the House had chosen between the two measures and had definitely rejected that of the hon. Gentleman and committed itself definitely to the other Bill. I would not like to ask the House to come to any decision like that. I say let us have our own second reading and own debate.

May I point out to the right hon. Gentleman that there was nothing—

I think the proposal and the counsels of the President of the Board of Trade are reasonable, provided that the course which he suggests will not prejudice the debate that is going on at the present moment. As the right hon. Gentleman knows, the opportunities of discussion on the part of private Members are few. An opportunity exists at the present moment, and if the present debate is not to be concluded great good might result from it. Subject to that consideration I counsel my hon. Friend to accept the proposal of the Government, which I think is reasonable.

It is evident from what has just taken place that we are not to consider too closely the proposed details of the Bill. We have to consider the general principle of fixing a minimum wage by means of some representative body, whether it be a wages board, or trades boards, or whatever it might be called. With my hon. Friend the Member for one of the divisions of Kerry and my hon. Friend the Member for West Belfast I had the honour of representing Ireland on the Select Committee on Home Workers. I, as a member of that Committee, assented to the general recommendations of that Committee in favour of the acceptance by home workers of a minimum wage to be effected through the operation of a district wages board. I think that I went myself a little further, because I voted in favour of an amendment which would have brought within the scope of the recommendations of the Committee both of these Bills. That is, the factory workers as well as the home workers would have been included. I am very glad that in both of these legislative proposals the factory workers are included. I think there is a positive advantage in including factory workers, for, from the point of view of the home workers, it might be dangerous if we were to include only home workers. If further restrictions were placed on home workers and not on factory workers we might drive work out of the home into the factory. There are a good many hon. Members in this House who are in favour of the extinction of home work in some trades. For my own part, I cannot say that I am. I think there are cases where it might be well if home work were extinguished, but there are cases where home work is carried on so well that I should not like to see it extinguished. I think that all my colleagues are favourable to the general principle of a minimum wage, but we must be allowed to make certain reservations. In the first place, we had before us on the Select Committee exceedingly little Irish evidence. It was only on the very last day that the Committee met that an Irish manufacturer from the city of Derry gave evidence. I do not press his evidence on the House, but the evidence of Mr. Walker, who has had great experience of the kind of work which is likely to be affected in Ireland by this Bill, did impress me, and I am bound to say that Mr. Walker's evidence left in my mind very strongly the impression that we should have to go very carefuly into the question of rural industries which might be affected more than what has been said. I must say—I suppose I shall be regarded as somewhat of a heretic by some of my hon. Friends opposite—Mr. Walker's evidence left upon my mind the very strong impression that in the case, at any rate, of certain industries there was very grave doubt whether this principle can be made effective in the absence of some protection against the introduction of cheaply-made goods from abroad. I am bound to say I think that the question will have to be faced. I do not regard that with the same apprehension as hon. Members opposite. You might be able to restrict your protection to certain trades without breaking down your Free Trade system. At any rate, there is the hesitation which I feel, looking at it from that point of view. In the second place, and apart altogether from the evidence which we received, and which will have left different impressions upon different minds, there is the general consideration which I venture to put before the House. If we take the industries in Ireland which would be affected by these Bills—shirt-making, underclothing, white goods generally—we find they are trades which are carried on mainly in the rural districts, and that they are carried on under conditions as dissimilar as possible to the conditions under which the same trades and the same processes are carried on in the great urban centres of this country, and though it may often be that the wages paid in the country districts in Ireland are less than the prices paid in London, yet it may very well happen that the wages paid in London may, in all the circumstances, be much less sufficient than in Ireland. Yet those two sets of people—the one working in Donegal on the hillside and the others in a London slum, differ toto cœlo in the conditions of their lives. Yet it is not very easy to so legislate as to distinguish between them or to entirely separate them. Undoubtedly they are engaged upon the same process of work, and your machinery must, I suppose, deal pari passu with both. Of course, I know a partial answer to that—and a very good answer as far as it goes—has already been indicated by the hon. Member for Barnard Castle. It is quite true, and it should be borne in mind that manufacturers of goods of the same process pay, even in the same town, and much more so in different parts of the country, various rates of wages, and there was considerable evidence that the better employers would welcome such a rising of wages as would enable them to pay a living wage without being ruined by the sweaters. But the matter is very complex, and I do not know how co-ordinating machinery, which is absent from this Bill but is present in the Government Bill, is going to work. I am under some apprehension as to the result. The theory, of course, is that in each district the wages board or the trades board will fix the wages according to the best employers—not in the United Kingdom, but in that district. The difficulty of ensuring that is not very great, but when we come to the question of co-ordinating the different districts, with their wide range and variety in the cost of the standard of living, it is different. I confess I have very grave doubt as to what will happen when the London shirt manufacturers come before the co-ordinating authority and say: "You are allowing people in Donegal to work for a lower rate of wages than you allow us to pay in London." Of course the answer will be that there is to be taken into account the cost of shipment of the goods to London and the cheaper rates of living in Donegal. But I am a little apprehensive of what may happen when the great organised body of London shirt manufacturers begin to put pressure upon the co-ordinating authority. I fear it may result in fixing a scale of cost on the Irish rural industries which may render it impossible for them to carry on their work in competition with this country. That fear, I hope, may be got over, because I do most earnestly desire that legislation of this kind should be taken in hand, and I very earnestly press the Government to give their earnest attention to that state of the problem as it affects the rural workers. These are some of the considerations which made it necessary for some of us to adopt a certain attitude of reserve. It must be made much more clear than it is at present how the proposals of the Government, if they are to pass, will work out in practice. At the same time, I should not like the House to think that we on these benches are either ignorant of, or indifferent to, the evils which this Bill is designed to meet. The evils are horrible of the existence in our midst of thousands of people, whose lives are one long grinding struggle with poverty, and who never from one year's end to another have time for thought for anything beyond getting their daily bread, which is at once a menace to our European civilisation and a disgrace to us. The evil is not merely a material evil but a moral one. These people are crushed out of all semblance to human beings, and, if I may quote the words of a lady whom it was my privilege to know when living—a woman surrounded as she was with every luxury, and full of interest and knowledge of all the most beautiful things in art and literature, yet gave herself more than to anything else to the cause of these poor people—I should say that those who are fighting this fight are, as she said, fighting not merely for the material welfare of these people but "to deliver the sacred city of the spirit from captivity to the heathenish traditions of modern industry." "It is," she wrote in another passage, "impossible for us to sit idly by whilst the anguish of our working sisters and their little ones lifts its voice to heaven.….They are crying to us for their redemption. The seal of death is on-their lips." I hope the record of the Irish party in all these matters will be sufficient assurance, at any rate, that though we are bound to exercise caution with regard to the people whom we particularly represent, that we are not in-different, and we wish to be always friendly to the effort which is made to uplift the most desolate class of our people. I may-say for myself that some hope, some desire in some way to be of use in matters of this kind, is one of the few attractions which life, with all its baseness, its intrigues and its ugliness, offers to one. I do not know whether I can express my own feeling about it better than in words again from the gifted woman, two passages from whose books I have already referred to. She asks: "Can any joy that we may win for ourselves equal the joy of knowing that by our efforts we have brought to the feeble, the ignorant and the lonely, to feel that they are not alone."

I do not propose to devote more than a few moments to address myself to this particular question, and I question whether I should have participated in the debate at all had it not been for the statement made by the hon. Baronet the Member for the City of London, who has, I think, again demonstrated this afternoon that he stands here in this House as the solitary political Robinson Crusoe. To-day he bemoaned the absence of his Man Friday, the hon. Member for Preston, and I think these two hon. Gentlemen are the two solitary picturesque figures, so far as politics are concerned, who are not in sympathy with this Bill. We may have differences as to how we can deal with this great problem, but I think in every corner of the House, among all sections, there is a real desire to remove by this measure the evil which is extending so rapidly in our towns and cities. The hon. Baronet said we should be well-advised to allow the laws of nature to operate, but I do not understand what be means. I take it, as I see the manifestations of the laws of nature, that they are evidenced more by physical ability than by mental power, and if the hon. Baronet were here I think he would refrain with myself from putting the physical law into operation to decide whether he should have his possessions or I should have them. I think that might prove to him that it was not always desirable to bring physical law into operation.

Then he said the object of this Bill was to fix all round rates of wages. I want to tell him as one associated with trade unions that I do not know one of them which would allow this Bill to apply to them. The trade unions are not supporting it because it applies to themselves, but because they know that these helpless creatures at the bottom of the social scale are unable to protect themselves from unscrupulous employers. The hon. Member waxed eloquent with indignation about the condition of the East End of London, and was thankful that no Englishman would tolerate the condition of things that existed in the East End of London in places where the aliens are employed. I am not going to support the horrible conditions of the East End of London. They are bad in the extreme; but I must say, that I join issue with him when he says that no Englishman was engaged under similar conditions. I think if he would go into the Black Country and see the women working in the chain trade he will say that the conditions are as horrible and degrading as you will find in the East End slum. I would also say in passing that these poor creatures have gone through tyranny and persecution, and have left countries where the life was crushed out of them, and we ought to help to raise them rather than allow them to be pushed lower by unscrupulous employers in the East End of London.

But, bad as the conditions are in the East End of London, they are nothing to boast about in the West End. The other day the London Drapers' Chamber of Commerce, whose deliberations I have sometimes to watch, had before them certain Gentlemen who had made certain charges against the drapery trade, and they stated that the tailoring department, the dressmakers, the mantle makers, and the milliners are the people who, in the West End of London, get these small wages which endanger the morals of young women engaged in those particular trades. I support the Government's proposal, but hope with my right hon. Friend the Member for the Forest of Dean that they will co-ordinate the powers of those who are to carry it out. There is nothing more irritating than these invisible lines of demarcation which separate one inspector from another. The Home Office is sending someone and the Board of Trade is sending someone, and the workman and the employer hardly know who is the responsible person who is to look after particular Acts of Parliament. I sincerely hope that in the attempt to co-ordinate we shall have something which will be reasonable, and which will be understood by the meanest and the commonest amongst us. With reference to the proposal made by the President of the Board of Trade, I have not had the opportunity of consulting the hon. Member for Barnard Castle, but I think I am justified in accepting the suggestion that so far as this party is concerned we are prepared to allow this Bill to be withdrawn, and if we are not able to lick the Government Bill into the shape that we like we will try and put forward this other Bill.

Another point I want to impress upon the House is the question of organised labour using this as a subterfuge for some ulterior motive. So far as organised labour is concerned to-day, probably more than in any other part of the history of Trade Unionism, we are strong in our own power. We are not anxious for this Bill for our own sake as organised workers, but we are anxious to save the unfortunate wrecks of humanity, those who are being exploited. I join with the hon. Gentleman who has just sat down, and we will do all we possibly can to help these unfortunate workers and to line up these unscrupulous employers with the best employers in the country.

I rather regret that my hon. Friend behind me should have felt it his duty to accept the proposal of the President of the Board of Trade and have this Bill adjourned. First of all one would like to know what will be the future of that Bill and at what period it is likely to be taken up again by the Government. Moreover, I should like to have secured at least a second reading, because in some ways my hon. Friend's Bill is better than the Government Bill, although he modestly said the Government Bill was better. There are two reasons why I should like to have seen my hon. Friend's Bill passed and dealt with first. One refers to that very difficult question, the exact control that the Board of Trade or the central Government office ought to have over the formation of these boards in different parts of the country. The hon. Member who spoke on the Irish benches thought there was too much centralising tendency under the Board of Trade, and that there should be some effort to level up wages, and so on, in the remoter parts of Ireland to the level of those obtaining in London, and he was afraid there would not be sufficient elasticity in that respect under the Government Bill. But that diffi culty applies not only to the West of Ireland, but to a great many districts in England as well. Take the question of the difference in wages in London and in the country and in provincial towns. Here again you have a great difficulty. You have different rates of wages prevailing, and if you get too stiff or hard a system for levelling up wages in one part of the country to those in another, you will simply throw the trade or the business from one part of the country to another. Though I am strongly in favour of the rule of giving every opportunity to local effort, I am not altogether against some controlling authority by the Board of Trade. Certainly it ought to watch and tabulate the statistics and the action of these boards in the different parts of the country; but I think in the first instance at least it is very important that these boards should be started in the trade and in the localities themselves. Then when you have found that perhaps some hard cases have not been dealt with I think it would be time for the Board of Trade to step in and nominate these boards and set them up itself.

The other point in which I prefer this Bill is this: The hon. Gentleman has tabulated certain trades. Of course, in the schedule to the Government Bill there is undoubtedly a larger number of trades included, but the particular trades which the hon. Member has tabulated have one advantage over some of those included in the Government Bill. We have heard a great deal of the question of foreign competition, and, of course, to apply these rules and regulations to trades in this country and not to deal with goods coming from other countries presents a very natural difficulty. But my hon. Friend has evaded that, because he has put in trades which are very little affected by foreign competition. The slop tailoring trade, and so on, produce in this country, and are also export trades, but the amount which comes into this country is at present, I believe, very small, and this factor of foreign competition would not operate to injure what might otherwise be the beneficent effect of these boards. It is quite clear that you will not get, as it were, a clear experiment if it is to be disturbed by foreign competition, or, shall I say, the entrance of aliens, who undoubtedly have the effect of disturbing and cutting down wages, and who have the most remarkable power of evading the inspector and the rules which are made for the control of these trades. The alien seems to me to display, in spite of his ignorance of the language, a greater ingenuity in evasion than the ordinary British citizen.

As regards what would happen to these trades if the rate of wages is increased, I think if trades have to be conducted in this country under such conditions as regards hours and wages that life becomes almost intolerable for those who are working under them, if it is really impossible for them to support decent life under these conditions without subsidies from their friends or from the rates, I think it is really better that these trades should disappear altogether. I cannot see any really national advantage which is to be obtained by helping along trades or giving them an artificial assistance by fixing the rates of wages if really the conditions under which the workers employed in these trades live are absolutely intolerable.

The hon. Member for Paddington took, of course, a rather hopeful view of the matter, and told us he supported these wages boards because efficiency generally gave greater cheapness, and that the introduction of superior classes of machinery is a good thing in ousting ordinary hand labour. That probably in the long run is true, but at the same time we have to face the condition of things, that the people at present engaged in these trades might themselves suffer, and be thrown out of work, because shorter hours, better wages, and so on cannot operate at once, and it is impossible for the displaced employés very much to improve their rate of work or their class of work, and it is inevitable, and it is a thing that we must face, that if you try to shorten hours and run up wages in this way a considerable number of persons who have lived under the old condition of things and are the product of those old conditions, must be thrown out of work.

There is another point that presents great difficulty as regards fixing wages. To some extent I agree that wages are fixed already as regards those who work for municipalities or the Government. It was only the other day that an alteration was made by the Government itself in the method of controlling contractors as to the hours of labour and other conditions of labour, and generally as to tightening up the conditions which prevail as regards contracts. But as regards many of these particular contracts the effect of these new conditions is really that the Government fix the rates of wages and also the hours of labour, because in many of these trades —and the municipalities found the same difficulty—there are no regular recognised prevailing rates of wages or hours of labour as agreed between employers and employed, and, therefore, in that case, taking all the circumstances and conditions into account, the municipality or the Government have actually to fix the rate of wages. Taking an example, I may refer to the case of a county council whose practice as regards contracts has long been to fix the rate of wages of piece work and of time work as well. Here you get into a matter of considerable difficulty as regards the method of doing it. So far the practice of municipalities generally has been to raise the rate of wages up to what is given by good employers in the trade. When you can find that out the matter presents no great difficulty, but it becomes far more difficult in some of these trades where in certain localities really there is no sufficiently established fair rate of wages at all. Here it seems to me you go a step further. You are not levelling up the bad employer to the level of the good employer. You are going to say what is the particular rate of wages which makes life tolerable to these people working in that particular trade. That is going much further than merely taking the best class of wages paid in a particular trade in a locality, and fixing that as a minimum. In that way a new principle is being established. I agree with what one hon. Member has said that one of the effects of a measure of this kind will be to cause considerable gratification to good employers themselves. In many trades it is a source of constant irritation to good employers that they are being perpetually undercut by others who are more ingenious and, I will say, unjust than they are, and who get large contracts simply because they do not treat the employés quite so well. The rates of wages in unorganised trades vary very much. The hon. Member behind me described differences of wages in the same towns and in the same parts of towns as regards the same class of work. He might have gone much further. I know a case myself where in the same street, within two doors of one another, one woman was getting 1d. for blouses and another woman was getting 2d., or double the amount, for the same class of work. That, I think, shows first of all the difficulty there must be in fixing these rates. It shows, also, the advantage really that it would be to good employers if the bad ones were compelled to pay a standard rate of wages. I think the House will agree that up to a certain point competition may be a good thing. It is a far-reaching principle. If you get beyond that point competition is not merely an evil itself, but it has an evil effect, not merely upon the employés, but upon the employers. If this Bill does anything towards limiting the amount of competition in particular trades I believe that would in itself be a very good thing to all those engaged in these particular trades. I quite admit, with the hon. Baronet, that this must be a considerable departure—this settling of the rate of wages—from all the old doctrines of political economy. I feel that strongly myself. I have been brought up in those old doctrines, and perhaps one cannot always depart from them altogether without a pang. But nowadays our attention is directed, perhaps, not so much to those principles, too rigidly held, as I believe, in the past, but rather to exceptions of those principles, and to cases where, I believe, we may even intervene most usefully and practically, and not perhaps on the whole damage the principle itself. The hon. Baronet expressed great fear that this principle once introduced may extend to all sorts of trades. Very well. If you introduce it to those particular trades where it is most necessary, where the conditions are most intolerable, and where the wages are least high, then I think you are making a splendid experiment, and you will be able to judge of the trade's limits, whether the people are thrown out of work, whether the standard of life is improved, and if it is a failure you can drop it. If it is not a failure you can improve upon it. No doubt we shall then have got beyond the region of theory, and on to solid ground of fact.

I do not pay much attention to the experiments of Australia and New Zealand. I believe the conditions are so much different to what they are in our crowded towns that you can draw very few deductions indeed from them. But if you can at once put into practice the suggestions made in the Bill of my hon. Friend I believe you will have most valuable lessons. I believe there is little danger in the application of rules of this kind to some of the worst trades which exist in this country. The hon. Member, speaking for the trade unions, combatted the fear of the hon. Baronet, and said there was very little danger of these rules spreading too far amongst the great industries. I think that is so. I rejoice at least in this that if you are going to make a new departure of this kind, you are going to make it for the benefit of those who are least able to take care of themselves, and not, as in the case of the Miners' Eight Hours Bill, on behalf of persons who are most able to take care of themselves, and most able to combine to defend themselves. I am glad of this, that the great trade unions, who have been accused, fairly or unfairly, of sometimes taking a rather selfish view of these unorganised workers, are giving this Bill very strong support, although they have told us, and recognise, that they do not want it for themselves. They can do perfectly well without it themselves, but they know that many of these people are living in such intolerable conditions that they are going to give the weight of their influence to support a Bill, which, though it does not affect them, may do something to mitigate the conditions of existence amongst those of the poorest and least capable of taking care of themselves.

Having had the honour of being Chairman of the Committee by which this Bill was considered last year, I should like to say a few words upon the present measure. No one who has given any attention to this subject can fail to realise that it is one of very considerable difficulty. It is not one to be solved easily in any direction, and it is also perfectly true that its solution will involve an important new departure. I agree with the hon. Gentleman opposite in the desirability of not giving too much attention to what is taking place in Australia. Not only are the conditions here different from what they are in Australia and New Zealand, but we must remember that the wages boards in those countries were the outcome of a considerable amount of depression in trade, which resulted from the serious financial collapse of some years ago. They were then in a desperate condition in Australia and New Zealand financially. These wages boards were then appointed, and during the years which have since elapsed these Colonies have been gradually improving their financial position and their trade has increased. There has been a gradual advance in wages and an improvement in the condition of the people, but that would have taken place altogether apart from the interference of the wages boards. There has been a great improvement in their financial position, as I have said, and the result has been that these wages boards up to recently have never had to deal with anything but increases of wages, and it is very much more easy for the masses of the people to consent to decisions when they are always in the direction of increases than it will be for them to consent when those boards come to deal with decreases. Therefore these boards in Australia and New Zealand have not been substantially put to any real test, and what will occur if they have to decide on a diminution of wages owing to altered conditions we do not know. In New Zealand there has already arisen considerable trouble and difficulty. For that reason, and for the reason that our position is altogether different from that which obtains in those Colonies, I do not think it is wise to attach too much importance to the work of the wages board there.

Then I am concerned very much personally with the conditions of the home workers in this country. It is the condition of the home workers which is worst, and in spite of the contention which was made by the hon. Member opposite, the reports from New Zealand point out that the operation of these boards there and in Australia has done extremely little for home workers. Besides, in New Zealand and Australia the women occupy an altogether different position from that of the women in this country. Here the women are the majority of the population. The whole position is different here. Labour in every direction is very different, and therefore socially the conditions are very different. I feel with regard to the Bill before us that it will require a good deal of amendment. I feel also that the Government Bill will require a good deal of careful consideration and amendment in important features. As to the general principle of the right of this House to interfere with the rates of wages I have no doubt whatever in my own mind. We have stepped in to interfere in matters of ventilation, cleanliness, and hours of labour. We have as a nation practically agreed that trades which cannot be carried on in factories and workshops on conditions which are something like satisfactory in respect of sanitation, cleanliness, protection of machinery, and hours of labour, ought not to be carried on, and we forbid them by law. I think it is a very short step, and a very necessary step, to come to the conclusion that there is nothing so essential to the well-being of the people as that they shall receive a rate of payment which would enable them to live under decent condi- tions. We have stipulated for sanitation and ventilation and shorter hours, and I think it is quite on the same lines that we should also stipulate that there should be a minimum standard of payment, and that if a trade which is carried on in this country will not yield a rate of payment which will enable people to live up to such a standard, that is a trade which ought not to exist and ought not to be permitted in this country.

As to the arguments used by the hon. Baronet the Member for the City of London, I think he would find every one of those arguments has been repeated at every stage of the passing of the Factory Acts in this country. Every Act that has been passed to regulate labour and improve the conditions in our factories has been met with the argument that it would mean increased cost of production, make things difficult, that there were poor people getting employment under those conditions, and that if they insisted on more stringent conditions that those people would be thrown out of work. That is the old argument used for the last 60 years against this kind of legislation. What has been the practical result? The practical result has been this every stiffening up of conditions, every improvement under the conditions under which work was done, has led to an increase in the efficiency of the workers, to an increase in the method of production, to the introduction of new machinery to a better process; and in the cheapening of the article and not making it dearer, and has certainly increased the output, and, as a rule, increased employment of labour.

May I point out that the Factory Acts, with which I thoroughly agree, differ totally from this Bill, and were passed by the Tory party.

Some were and some were not. They are not different in principle. I should say that the greatest obstacle in the way of progress, improved conditions and efficiency is low wages. Nothing stands so much in the way of invention of new machinery as low wages. Low wages do not mean cheap production. The lowest wages we have got in the world are in China and India, and I cannot call to mind a single invention or discovery in manufacturing processes that came from either China or India, simply because you have such a low rate of wages. Here in Lancashire, in the great cotton industry, working with high skill and under con- siderable regulations, they can compete with the low wage people of India in the cloth which they produce, and which is sent to all parts of the world. In a country where wages are high you stimulate invention, scientific discovery, new processes; you stimulate efficiency and cheaper production and better conditions.

One point we want to bear in mind in connection with this question is this, that this home work and what is called sweated labour is not in direct competition to a very large extent with the production of competition by machinery. Some people denounce in a wholesale manner those who pay low wages as sweaters. If you are using the word "sweater" in an offensive or opprobious sense it does not at all follow that they are sweaters who are making big profits and paying a very small rate. There may be such cases, but it is not the general rule. As a rule these low rates of payment, as they appear to be, are made for work which is being done in competition with machinery, and the payment is not a low rate for the work done by machinery, but it is a low rate for a person doing it by hand. I have seen a girl making buttonholes in waistcoats and coats, for which she was paid 4½d. a gross, and she was earning a good wage at it too. But they were made by complicated machinery, driven by power, and the rate at which they were turned out was marvellous. If you were to pay a woman 4½d. a gross for making buttonholes by hand, it would be a deplorable price, but it would not be fair to call it a sweating price in that sense. She would be competing with machinery, and you cannot very well pay more for work done by hand than for the same work done by machinery. That is one of the difficulties you have to bear in mind. Then there is a wonderful difference in the amount of work done by a machine driven by power and that done by a similar machine driven by hand or treadle. I was told that a sewing machine driven by power will make about 4,500 stitches a minute, whereas when driven by treadle it will make only about 800. A machine driven by steam power will turn out four or five times as much work as one driven by hand or treadle, and a person working at a steam-driven sewing machine will earn three or four times as much as a person working a treadle machine at the same rates of payment. Therefore, the question of machinery comes in very closely indeed.

Another instructive point came out in our inquiry. It was not at all demonstrated that this sweating is the result of the introduction of alien labour. It was not at all shown that sweated labour is alien labour. So far as we had evidence it tended to show that the worst paid people were English women. Some of those who employed these ill-paid people may have been aliens, but it is not alien labour that works at the lowest rates in this country. I was very much impressed by the evidence, which tended to show that these alien workers, especially men who come in as tailors and others, seem to have a knack and ability, not only in the direction suggested of evading regulations, but of getting very decent wages in the tailoring and other trades. Then, with regard to the question of foreign competition, we wished to avoid turning our Committee into a Tariff Reform inquiry, and it was only to that extent that I ventured now and then to suggest a check. But we did not gather from the inquiry—certainly I did not— that the trades in which the worst conditions of labour prevail are those which are to any extent affected by foreign competition. The ready-made clothing trade is not appreciably affected by foreign competition. My judgment is that foreign competition does not enter into this phase of the question at all.

I hope the right hon. Gentleman remembers the lace trade.

That is a trade of a different nature. The competition with hand-made lace is one where machinery comes in. We can in most of the trades affected meet foreign competition very successfully by those firms who employ machinery freely, but it is in regard to the home workers in these trades, owing to their inability to compete with machinery, that we have the low rates of payment. In my judgment the key to the solution of this question is the establishment of a minimum time rate of pay. I fail entirely to see how you are to grapple with the question without. Of course, nobody suggests that if you establish a minimum time rate that everyone is to earn that rate when he is working at piece. The suggestion is that there should be a minimum time wage, and that no piece rate should be allowed which will not allow the ordinary average worker working at that piece rate to earn not less than the time amount. Unless you have some foundation of that kind to enforce piece rates would fail. Take the piece rates which have come within the purview of this Bill. The variations in pattern and size and quality of the various articles are so numerous that even if you should fix a piece rate for every variation there is now it would be a very simple matter indeed for an employer who wished to evade that piece rate to alter that article in some small degree as to enable him to escape responsibility. This is not a regulation made between a trade union and employers without going to a court of law. This is a regulation the violation of which is to be punished by prosecution in a court of law, and therefore if you bring an employer into court and charge him with not having paid the fixed rate you will have to prove that that particular article was the exact article for which the rate was fixed, and if it varies in any small degree you will be unable to prove your charge. But if you have a minimum time rate and you can show that the arrangement is as I have suggested it will be different.

Will the right hon. Gentleman kindly say whether during the evidence heard before the Committee a single witness was ever asked whether the minimum time rate was possible?

I am not sure about that. But the Committee will remember that when we adopted this time rate we had had a good deal of evidence to indicate the difficulty of enforcing the piece rates where variations were made. One manufacturer of boxes was before us, and pointed out how the prices in making cardboard boxes varied, not only according to the kind and shape of the boxes, but according to the kind of paper used in covering the boxes. Some paper required much more time than other kinds of paper. All these variations impressed upon my mind the great difficulty in having piece rates to fit every kind and shape of article, and that we do want a minimum time rate for the foundation of the Bill, or we shall never be able to carry out the desired purpose. Therefore, I attach enormous importance to that. Then there is another thing. Suppose you are making any particular article. Suppose you are making trousers. The time and the payment made will depend very much upon the quality of the stitching. If the stitches are large and wide, the poor girl making them is able to work more quickly than when the stitches are close together. There is the utmost difficulty when talking to people in the trade in getting at the actual facts in these matters. I will give one instance. I went into a large clothing works in Leeds, and when I saw the manager he attacked me very strongly because we had had a witness before us who stated that trousers could be made at 10¾d. per pair. The manager said, "It is an abominable thing that it should be stated that trousers are made at so low a rate as 10¾d.," and he denounced the Committee for hearing a witness who gave evidence so utterly unreliable. It was suggested that the manager should come and give evidence before the Committee, but he did not accept that invitation. I went into other works on the afternoon of the same day, and in the course of examination some trousers were shown to me, and I was told that 10d. per pair was paid for making them. I said to the manager, "I am rather interested in this. Can you tell me what your girls earn in making these trousers," and he replied, " 20s. per week." "How long do they work?" I asked, and he replied, "49 hours a week." I thought that was really good pay. I said to the manager: "Do you mind showing me your books?" They kept their books very carefully, and I found that the girls were earning from 17s. to 23s. It was, therefore, quite true that they were earning an average of 20s. in making these trousers at 10d. per pair. After that I had a case brought before the House here with respect to a firm in Loudon, who sent a letter to another large firm of makers of ready-made clothing, in which they offered to make trousers for them—to cut them out, to make and finish them, and deliver them complete at 7s. 6d. per dozen, that is, 7½d. per pair. This offer was made by a manufacturer, and, therefore, if he was going to make them at 7½d. he must have had a profit, after allowing for rent and everything else. It is perfectly clear that he must have been paying not more than 5d. per pair to the worker. I asked a friend to send down and find out what was the position of this firm, and he said: "It is a very good factory, very well equipped, the girls look healthy, clean and respectable, and they seem to be doing very well." I asked him if he could get me a pair of these trousers, because the manufacturer not only proposed to make the trousers, but suggested that he would supply them at from 18s. to 30s. per dozen. I said to my friend, "Will you get me a pair of these 1s. 6d. trousers?" The Members of the Committee will remember that we had a pair of the 1s. 6d. trousers which were made under these conditions. It was very obvious when we looked at the trousers that they were made not in the way of the tic users we are accustomed to wear. The stitching was looser and much rougher, but there they were. My point is that in setting out the rate of wages to be paid for the making of trousers, it will be necessary to have the kind of stitching defined in very great detail if you are to differentiate between the different classes and quality of sewing, and unless you have as a basis a minimum wage, I am certain that there will be a loophole through which the whole arrangement will slip. It seems to me that that is the key of the position. I am extremely grateful to the Government for introducing their Bill. We have a difficult problem before us, and we will require all the ability and help we can give to the Government in framing a workable scheme. If I venture to offer some criticisms upon this Bill it is for the purpose of pointing out one or two considerations which must be kept in view in dealing with this question, and not for the purpose of objecting to the Bill in principle. I have great doubts of the wisdom of a trade board appointing committees throughout the country and co-ordinating the whole. My view is that it would be better to begin in the localities. I believe in what an hon. Member from Ireland said when he alluded to a board in London dealing with the making of shirts in Donegal. Here you have Leeds, Manchester, Leicester, the Potteries, and other places making clothes, and yet it is proposed to rely upon a central board to fix the wages. My opinion is that they should be fixed in the first instance between the workers and their employers in the localities, and that the co-ordination should come afterwards. I feel this more particularly with regard to home workers, because they are the poorest and most distressed in the community, whilst at the same time they are the most difficult people to deal with. They are unorganised and extremely poor. They are invariably women, and cannot leave their homes. How are you to get representatives of these people from various parts of the country to come to London and sit on the board? I do not see how a board in London is to get the confidence of these people and deal successfully with their cases. I should much prefer local boards in the first instance. The people in the localities understand their own difficulties and circumstances, and we should be able to deal with them best by the people immediately concerned with these workers. If their wages are to be fixed by persons hundreds of miles away great difficulties will arise. Our Committee recognised that you should confine the operation of these Bills to home workers. They are the poorest, the least organised, the least able to defend or to protect themselves. If you have a board dealing with a trade the work of which is largely done in factories and at home, my fear is that the board would be a board constituted mainly of factory workers. In fact I believe the factory workers would dominate the situation. They are people with more time on their hands than the poor women and girls working in their own homes, and, as I said, I fear they would dominate the situation. It would be a factory workers' board, and when the workers and the home workers are dependent upon each other there would certain to be between them rivalry and competition. If the board were a factory workers' board it would not likely fix a rate of payment favourable to the home workers.

I would much rather we began with the home workers, with the poorest of the poor, the less organised, the less able to defend themselves. I am afraid if we were to pass them over to the factory boards they would be outvoted. The hon. Baronet the Member for the City of London was very much troubled lest we should deprive some existing workers of their earnings. I am sure we all feel this difficulty, but I am afraid it would be impossible to take any step forward of this kind without running some risk of placing some people in difficulty. But wherever we have people working at industries that do not yield wages sufficient to enable them to live decently they are, in the proper sense of the term, parasite industries. They are subsidised by poor law relief, and I think it is not in the interest of the individual that these industries should continue, and, personally, I am prepared to say that they ought to die out, and that the nation should take upon itself the responsibility of maintaining the people thrown out in that way if they are unable to get employment in other directions. These people bring up their families under the same conditions. You find a woman home worker with half a dozen children; she has them all at her trade; they work with her at home at this trade, trying to earn a miserable livelihood. These children will grow up unskilled workers, unfit for anything else. They drift on at this work and thus it is we perpetuate this miserable system. It is not that these people make things better than they are made elsewhere. We shall make them in the factory better, and the people will be employed there, and it is merely a transition, and I am quite sure the nation would be prepared to pay any additional cost that would have to be paid to help those people over these difficulties, if we could get rid of this miserable system of sweating, which, I am sure, we all feel to be one of the greatest blots upon our civilisation.

I am sure the House will feel indebted to the hon. Baronet, who was Chairman of the Select Committee, for the very valuable contribution he has made to the debate on this Bill. Some of his criticism produced in my mind a profound impression as to the difficulties we shall have to face in this matter. Personally, I hope we are setting out upon a path we may be able to pursue to its logical end. I have great hopes in that direction. The right hon. Gentleman, I think, put his finger on a blot in regard to the constitution of the wages board. I think there will be considerable difficulty, and very considerable difficulty, in that matter. The conditions are very various, not only between the different parts of the country, but between the country districts and the towns. The hon. Member for West Donegal pointed out how wages, which in country districts in Ireland would be sufficient, would be totally inadequate for people in cities and towns. A board dealing with local conditions would be aware of all such circumstances as the prices of food, house rents, etc., whereas a central board would be entirely ignorant of such matters. I venture to think the right hon. Gentleman the Member for the Spen Valley in pointing out these things has put his finger on the right spot. Then the right hon. Gentleman said that not only this Bill, but that of the President of the Board of Trade would require considerable amendment before they would carry out his views as Chairman of the Committee in regard to the conditions which would have to be faced. When he pointed to the low price at which trousers could be made, it really did seem as if it were impossible to arrange for these home workers, when we are dealing with ma- chinery so effective and cheap and so much in use. There is certainly nothing in this legislation contrary to the principles of the party to which I belong, and here I speak with bated breath, with my hon. Friend the Member for the City of London sitting behind me. Much legislation has been generally directed to improving, if possible, the conditions of labour of those who are less able to look after themselves. Our factory laws, our sanitary laws, our laws as to overtime, even the eight hour day for miners are all interferences with the employers—we hope and believe in a good direction—but they all have gone to limit the profits which the employers would make, and it is a very short step indeed to regulating the wages that the workers may earn.

In spite of the legislation there are helpless women living in miserable homes, unorganised, unable to bring any, or very little, political influence to bear, and I think this House is agreed that if we can do something to ameliorate their conditions, we are not doing anything to traverse the principles laid down by the Leader of the party. We have gone a long way to deal with these people under the Particulars Clause in which particulars of the various classes of work are carefully drawn up in order that each may know what he is entitled to, and this Particulars Clause applies to some 350,000 or 400,000 workers. As to inspection I should like to draw his attention to the point raised by the right hon. Baronet the Member for the Forest of Dean. If you are going to make inspection effective you must have the same kind of inspection. I understand that under the Board of Trade Bill the question of inspection is not to be left entirely to His Majesty's inspector at the Home Office. There is to be a different staff. I venture to tell the hon. Member that he is making a mistake. If you have a conflict of jurisdiction between the Board of Trade and the Home Office you will make the working of any measure of this kind impossible. You must have the whole of the staff under one head, and if you have the Home Office Inspector, the Board of Trade Inspector, and the Sanitary or Local Government Board Inspector there will be confusion. I venture to say that is another blot upon the proposals contained in what we must really regard as the effective legislation; as that is the Bill which has been read a first time, and which is to take the place of the Bill we are discussing. There will be undoubted difficulties. Some employers have already endeavoured to fix a minimum wage. There is a significant paragraph in the report, which shows that a certain number of employers in Nottingham endeavoured to fix a minimum rate for their workers and that others would not, and the result was that the intermediaries, who go between the actual employer and the worker, were able to shuffle the cards, as it were, and take a proportion of the wages, which should have been paid to the workers, in their own pockets.

But the difficulty that has not been faced in the debate so far is the question of foreign competition. You cannot slip off by saying that these aliens in many cases are earning higher rates of wages than the home workers, because, at any rate, they displace a certain number of the home workers. But, in addition to that, you must face the difficulty in which you will be placed by the fact that if you raise the wages of these people you will make it more profitable for work produced under sweated conditions abroad to come into this country and take trade away from these people entirely. That is a question which must be faced sooner or later, and I think it is scarcely creditable that when a Bill was introduced by a private Member only the other day and an opportunity was given to the House at least to discuss the question, and form a conclusion upon it, the House absolutely declined even to give a first reading to that Bill. The very report of the Committee upon which this Bill has been based points out the difficulty that we shall have to meet from foreign competition. It says in one place: that of people who have to live under shelter from the inclement weather and pay house rent and burn coal for six or seven months in the year you are rendering it extremely difficult for this class of people to get a living at all. You will displace them.

May I ask whether the hon. Gentleman refers to the competition of low-paid industries abroad or to the competition of alien labour at home here?

Two subjects have been alluded to in the course of this debate. The question turns on the two points: One was that of the alien being permitted to come in here and depress the general standard of wages. The answer given to that by the Chairman of the Committee who inquired into this matter was that he found that, on the whole, the aliens got better wages than some of the workers affected by this Bill. That is a question on which I must bow to his superior information, but at any rate they do to a certain extent depress the wages of those whom they employ, for, whilst they get better wages themselves, they are largely the people who employ the English sweated labour in this country. That is a most undesirable state of affairs, as the hon. Member will agree. I there leave that subject. I now come to the question of sweated industries from abroad which are allowed to come in here and compete with labour in this country. However much we may strive to raise the condition of these people, we shall fail, and fail absolutely, unless we take into consideration the conditions of labour producing, under cheaper conditions, goods which come in here and compete in this country. It is there, I venture to say, that there is a blot in this Bill. Would the Government go so far as to make this declaration: that, in the orders which they give for goods, they will be careful to see that they do not purchase goods from abroad, even at cheaper prices, which have been made under conditions that they will not permit in this country? Will the Government say if they will do that?

Will the hon. Member be able to explain to us how we can discriminate between goods that come from abroad, which are cheaper because they are made by machinery with proper labour, and goods that are cheaper because they are made by hand with low-priced labour?

The hon. Member is asking me to enter into an argument with him on Tariff Reform generally. I would like to take a more favourable opportunity, when Mr. Speaker's eye is not upon me, to enter into that elaborate question. Now we are dealing not with machine-made goods—there will always be competition between machine and hand-made goods. We are dealing with goods made by hand both abroad and in this country. We are told by the Report of this Committee that similar goods are made abroad where the labour is cheaper and the conditions of life are less onerous—

We are also told by the Committee that one of the chief causes of sweating is the competition of machine-made goods.

We are not legislating in this Bill for factory workers. We are endeavouring to legislate for home workers, who do not generally work with machinery.

We are legislating for both.

Then you are legislating in advance of the Report of this Committee. All the House has to go on so far is the evidence that has been presented to it by this Committee, who considered the question very carefully, and, I think, has given us a very valuable contribution towards the question; and so far as this Bill goes beyond the Report of the Committee, I think so far is it probably in error. The Committee recommended that legislation should be confined to home workers, and recommended that legislation should in the first place be of an experimental character. Now I think that those recommendations have the support of the hon. Baronet, who is Chairman of that Committee, and so far as this Bill is concerned, and so far as the Bill in which the hon. Member the Parliamentary Secretary for the Board of Trade will probably be concerned, go beyond these recommendations, they are likely to come to grief. The Committee recommended that we should experiment gently in this direction. The hon. Member, and the Government of which he is a distinguished ornament, propose not to limit their legislation to purely sweated industries, but to give the power—[THE PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY TO THE BOARD OF TRADE (Mr. H. J. Tennant) dissented]—I am afraid the hon. Member is not familiar with the point—to extend it to other trades, this system and these boards. As I understand it, under the proposal of the Government, in any further trades which may be added, there must be an opportunity for 30 days in this House to consider the matter. We all know the opportunities of those 30 days when questions of this kind nominally come under the purview of the House. It is almost impossible to avail yourself of these opportunities because the House is reluctant to sit after 11 o'clock at night. I think this class of legislation will be extremely difficult if you take no cognisance of the importation of cheap-made foreign goods. I would call the attention of the hon. Member to the suggestion that if he could secure an international agreement to see that in these trades similar requirements to our own were carried into effect, it might help. I think even, perhaps, you might be able to advance along that line. We on this side of the House, as well as hon. Members opposite, would like to see an advance made. Who wants to see these unfortunate women earning a penny per hour under the miserable and wretched conditions of semi-starvation? If he can do anything to mitigate such conditions I am perfectly certain that he would have no more enthusiastic supporters. But I do warn the hon. Gentlemen opposite that if they confine themselves to merely fixing the wages on this side without regard to the conditions of labour, and the goods which come from abroad and compete with them, they are aiming at almost certain failure. I understand that this Bill is not seriously to be proceeded with, but that the adjournment is likely to be moved. I would like to ask the hon. Member how that can further the cause of this class of legislation? When will the Government Bill be likely to come up for its second reading? It is obvious to the House that the whole of the time of this House will be taken up till very nearly the end of May, and the opportunity of discussing this question in Grand Committee will almost have passed away. Although, of course, it is impossible to do otherwise than agree to the proposals made by the Government, I should have thought that it is not particularly in the interests of the Bill itself, and this class of legislation, that further stages should be so long deferred.

I must say that I am a greater believer in the desire of the Government to deal with this question than to suppose that they wish to defer the consideration of their Bill until the end of May, and until it is not possible to get the measure through Committee. It is an indication of the general interest taken in this question that it has passed in one year from the Private Benches to the Government Benches. Last year it received an almost unanimous expression of approval, and it would be certainly singular if the Government, encouraged by that expression of opinion, and having prepared a Bill of their own, were then to do their best to destroy it. That unanimous expression of opinion did not omit from view that these proposals might meet with some objections, and today's debate has revealed the fact that some objections must be met. On the one side we have the very large and preponderating mass of opinion of those who feel that something must be done, and there are certain proposals which are generally accepted. It augurs much for the success of those proposals that there is an absence of dogmatism and a general willingness to learn from discussion. On the other hand, we have discovered to-day that there are those who say that nothing can be done, or that what is proposed is worse than useless, and those who express their warmest sympathies, but object to any Government action or direct interference with freedom of contract, just as they object to direct taxation. Some of them, we find, look forward to fiscal arrangements. One reason why many of us do not agree that there is any fiscal cause for this disease, or that anything in the nature of a fiscal remedy would have any influence upon it, is the fact that the evil exists in Free Trade and Protectionist countries alike—in the old and the new countries alike, and therefore we conclude that it is not the supreme cause. It is rather the disease of a more complex civilisation, and the greater the complexity of civilisation, and the greater the concatenation of human atoms in great cities, the more serious does this disease become. So far, I think, the beginnings of this disease in some trades has been met by trade organisations, and if we are to cure it I think it would be well if we promote organisations on the lines which have been generally successful. I think it is most necessary, as the right hon. Member for Spen Valley indicated, that we should endeavour always to take into consideration to the fullest degree local circumstances. That was well pointed out by of the hon. Members, who dealt with the conditions of Ireland, which differ very considerably from those which exist in our large towns. I cannot help but feel that the Government measure should adhere to our past experience, and the experience which has been gained by trade unions. The hon. Member for Taunton expressed the fear lest these proposals should throw trade from one side of the country to the other. Well, these are things which the trade union organisations have had to take into consideration. The masters and workmen know the local circumstances, and they form their lists of wages and lists of hours accordingly. Taking one of the trades, with which I am more familiar than with any other, that is the printing trade, it is not the superior national organisation which forces upon any district a particular rate of wages or rules; it is the local masters and workmen who together come to some arrangement. If they cannot come to some arrangement, then the workmen apply to their superior organisation, and are doubtless assisted. But there is no superior national organisation which has enforced its will upon localities where the standard of life may be lower and where any undue pressure may do injury to the trade in those districts. In some districts the wages of the printing trade will be three times as large as in some of the superior districts.

In regard to the fiscal point, I should like to take note of the declaration of the hon. Baronet the Member for the City of London that British trade has hitherto been successfully carried on, and that the conditions of British labour at present please him. The Member for the St. Albans Division also made an admission which I think we ought to take note of in that connection. He is afraid of the artificial raising of wages. But are not wages artificially raised in tariff countries? He fears that goods from those countries might injuriously affect us, and yet in the foreign countries, he admits that there are longer hours of labour and lower wages.

I am sure the hon. Member does not wish to misrepresent me. What I said was that in some countries the rates of wages were lower.

I think the argument of the hon. Member was based on a fallacy, and that was that low conditions of labour and low wages necessarily mean cheapness. In this connection you must take the general condition of Free Trade to produce a high state of labour, and then we must be willing to impose upon the community the burden of seeing that those conditions are generally spread through the whole of the labour of the country.

In accordance with an arrangement made between the right hon. Gentleman the President of the Board of Trade and the right hon. Gentleman the Member for St. Georges, I beg to move "That this debate be now adjourned."

Question, "That the debate be now adjourned," put and agreed to.

Debate to be resumed upon Monday next (29th March).

moved "That this Bill be now read a second time."

I beg to formally move the rejection of the Bill. The hon. Baronet in charge of the Bill has not given us any particulars concerning the Bill, neither has he advanced any reasons or arguments why this Bill shoud be brought forward. I do not doubt there are some reasons for acting in that way, and the first was that we on this side of the House were not quite as awake as usual, and that in a moment of absence he would get his Bill through. The second point no doubt was that he had no arguments to offer to the House. The first part of the Bill says: "In consequence of a Royal Commission which sat on Welsh Sunday Closing," certain things are to ensue. Practically this Bill is founded on the Report of the Welsh Royal Commission. I took the trouble to go to the Library to obtain the Report of that Royal Commission, which sat in 1890, or 19 years ago, and I found that the only copy had disappeared. Whether the hon. Baronet had taken it—

And it being Five of the clock, the debate stood adjourned.

Debate to be resumed upon Friday, 23rd April.

I desire to call the attention of the Committee to a point of some importance, upon which I shall be glad to have any assurances the Government may be able to give. This clause enables the Treasury to borrow from any person, by the issue of Treasury bills or otherwise, a sum or sums not exceeding in the whole £48,670,405 4s. 10d., a large sum, representing about three-fourths of the provision for the services of the year. I desire to move the insertion of the following proviso at the end of the first sub-section:—

"That the Treasury shall repay the monies so borrowed, with interest not exceeding five per cent. per annum, out of the growing produce of the Consolidated Fund, at a period not later than the next succeeding quarter to that in which the said monies were borrowed." If that were carried, I should move the omission of sub-section two as a consequential Amendment. The point is extremely simple. My proposal would put the borrowing powers of the Treasury under this Bill back to the position which they always occupied in this House up to the year 1902, when, in a moment of inattention, I think—that is the only explanation I can conceive—the powers of the Treasury in respect of borrowing were increased by this House from three months, to which they had been rigidly confined before, to a period of twelve months. Under the old system the Treasury was only empowered to borrow money on Treasury bills for three months. At the end of that time the whole of the debt was repaid to the lender, and if more provision was necessary we borrowed again, though that usually was not necessary. This proposal is new since 1902, and it increases the power of borrowing by the Treasury fourfold, not in respect to amounts, but in respect to the time for which they are allowed to borrow. It is without necessity and a great public disadvantage. This extension of the powers of Treasury borrowing means an increase of the unfunded debt. You have over 12 months instead of three months, as I propose, to increase the total indebtedness of the country. I do not think that is necessary, and I think it is increasingly dangerous at this time, when we are having other burdens put upon us. I do hope the Committee will be able to consider proposals which will do no harm to anybody or to the public service, and which will increase the borrowing powers of this House over the borrowing powers of the Treasury, and will put back the borrowing powers to the position they were in up to 1902. This is a very simple proposal, and I hope the Secretary to the Treasury will be able to give some assurance.

Question proposed: "That the words proposed be there inserted."

The hon. Gentleman who has moved the Amendment has, I understand a hereditary interest in the discussion on the Committee stage of the Consolidated Fund Bill, because I rather fancy there was a predecessor of his in the House who made unsuccessful attempts—

No, successful.

To discuss this Bill on the present stage some five or six years ago. The Amendment would have the effect, as I understand it, of completely altering the character of the methods by which money is borrowed on Treasury Bills. As I understand the Amendment it is that Treasury Bills shall be repaid at 5 per cent. interest. The whole principle on which they are based is that they are money lent not on interest at all, but the profit on them is arrived at by the difference between the price paid by the public for them at the time of issue and the sum which is repaid for them by the Treasury at the time of redemption. Therefore to introduce the principle of interest in Treasury Bills is, as I understand it, a new departure.

The hon. Gentleman will see that this clause refers not only to Treasury Bills. It says "or otherwise."

I am dealing with the Amendment as I find it on the Paper, and if the words of the Amendment were inserted it would have the effect that Treasury Bills would be repayable at 5 per cent. interest.

Not exceeding 5 per cent.

That would imply some rate of interest. The practice to which the hon. Gentleman refers obtained in 1902, and I should have thought he would be very unwilling to have broken in upon the practice established by a Chancellor of the Exchequer of his own faith, and which has met with the consent of the House for the last five or six years. I certainly cannot accept the proposal which the hon. Gentleman makes. I think it would have a very unfortunate effect on the finances of this country, and particularly on the method of financing the country by means of Treasury Bills.

I think it is inadvisable to alter the method proposed by the Bill. The result of giving an extension of the power given by the Act of 1902 is to enable the Treasury to borrow more cheaply than otherwise they would be able to do. If the rate of discount on bills is lower for three than for six months the country gets the benefit, and similarly, if a Bill is issued for 12 months, and the rate of discount is cheaper than for three or six months, it gets the benefit in that form. I do not think the Secretary to the Treasury properly described the thing as not being interest, because discount in this case is equivalent to interest. It would be distinctly inadvisable to introduce the method proposed by the hon. Member for Norwood.

I am sorry the Secretary to the Treasury cannot more favourably consider the proposal, and he will forgive me for saying that I do not think the Committee should be strongly moved by the argument he has put before it. This clause is not at all confined to Treasury Bills. It gives the Treasury power to borrow up to this vast sum, whether by Treasury Bills or otherwise. Since the hon. Gentleman cannot accept the proposal, and since, evidently, the Committee is not in a position now to debate the matter fully, I should not feel justified in pressing the Amendment, and, therefore, I ask leave to withdraw it.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Clauses 3 and 4 agreed to.

Bill reported without Amendment; to be read the third time upon Monday next.

Whereupon Mr. Speaker adjourned the House without Question put, in pursuance of Standing Order No. 3.

House adjourned at fourteen minutes after Five of the clock till Monday next.