MASTERS AND APPRENTICES.

Auckland Star, Volume XXV, Issue 165, 12 July 1894, Page 9

MASTERS AND APPRENTICES.

PROPOSED LEGISLATION,

A GOVERNMENT BILL.

(E7 TELEGRAPH. —PAKLIAMENTART? REPORTER. ) Wellington, this day. The Masters and Apprentices Bill, introduced by the Minister of Labour, contains . a number of new proposals which are certain to be keenly canvassed, and 1 hear already thab some of the so-called labour members are antagonistic to some of its provisions. The Bill proposes to introduce a rigid and almosb universal apprenticeship system, and to fix rates of wages. Ib proposes that no young person shall be employed at any handicraft or manufacture of articles for .trade or sale, unless he has been properly indentured and apprenticed. Under this Act any Buch person may apply to his master to be duly apprenticed and indentured, and if the master should fail to grant his request, shall apply to a Magistrate, who may cause him to be bound. After tho pastaing of the Act, any young person employed at handicraft at the commencement of tbe year shall within six months be apprenticed. Any young person may serve on a month's probation before being bound as an apprentice, and shall receive such pay for that month as may be agreed upon. No master shall put away or ttausfer ,his apprentices without consent of a magistrate. Every young person, whether apprenticed of not, on leaving a service, shall be entitled to a certificate setting forth the nature of the work, character, and length of employment. Any magistrate, parent, or guardian may apply to tbe Minister for Labour tor the appointment of 'aD expert to examine any apprentice, to discover whether he is being properly tuiighb. If it is proved that he is being so taught expense of examination will fall upon ' the applicant, otherwise on the master, who will be required to remedy the defects in tbe apprentices teaching. Any master ill-treating an apprentices or failing to properly instruct his apprentice shall bo liable to penalties not exceeding £10. Apprentices shall be liable to punishment by a magistrate for miscondncb or absence from duty, for which they may be fined by magistrate £1, and for any gross offence indobentnres may be cancelled. The Bill proposes to recognise different rates of pay for male and fomale workers, as it provides thab a. regular scale of wages must be paid to an apprentice, bearing the following proportion to adults of the same sex in such handicraft: — Firafc year, 14 per cent. ; second, 20 per cent. ; third, 30 por cent. ; fourth, 50 per cent. ; fifth, CO per cent. ; sixth, 75 per cent. In case of watchmakers and printers a special scale is provided as follows: —First year, 9 percent. ; second, 15 per cent.; third, 21 por conb. ; fourth, 28 per cent. ; fifth, 40 per cent. ; sixth, 60 per cent. Tho Bill applies to apprentices of both sexes, "young porson " being defined to mean any one nob under 14 or over 18 years of age, and " handicraft " as any clans of trade or manual or skilled occupation, and the various branches thereof, bub tho term does not include articled law clerks or * professional or acientiiic men. Inspectors are to bo appointed nnder the Act, and power is given to magistrates to indenture apprentices from orphanages and industrial schools. The apprenticeship shall not exceed six years, and shall cease ab the age of 21, or on marriage, in the case of a girl. No apprentice under 16 years of age shall be employed more than eighb hours in one day or more than forty-five hours in one weak.