REFORMING DOLE SCHEME

Press, Volume LXX, Issue 21255, 29 August 1934, Page 11

REFORMING DOLE SCHEME

YOUTHS NOW COVERED COMFI LSOR V INSTRUCTIONPLAN ,F-K!II-H 1i1HU..:.. VtEELt.?-, (Received August 28, 5.5 p.m.) RUGBY, August 27. About 700,000 juvenile workers not. now insured will from next Monday reap the benefits of State insurance, because of the provision made in the Unemployment Act for lowering the age of entry. Hitherto, although most boys and girls leave school and obtain employment soon after reaching 14, they have not come under the Unemployment Insurance Act until the age of 10, and there has, in consequence, been a gap of two years. This meant that the majority of boys and girls on passing out ot school have for two years also passed out of the range of supervision and guidance provided by the organisations specially set up to give them advice and assistance during the early years of their industrial life. After September practically all juveniles of 14 years and over who are working for an employer will be insurable, unless they are employed in agriculture or domestic service in private houses, or are apprentices receiving no wages. The Unemployment Act provides for the establishment of courses of instruction for unemployed boys and girls between the school-leaving age and 18 years. For the first time a statutory obligation is imposed on education authorities to provide such courses, and for the first time the Minister lor Labour is empowered to require the attendance at a course of instruction of any unemployed boy or girl of this - Attendance at a course of instruction will be enforced in the same way as attendance at school. The object of the courses of instruction is to prevent the demoralisation which so soon threatens boys and girls when they have nothing to occupy their hands or minds.