CHILD LABOUR

Evening Post, Volume CX, Issue 49, 26 August 1930, Page 10

CHILD LABOUR

WHAT THE LAW

PROVIDES

REVIEW BY MINISTER

In reference to the discussion on the subject of child labour at a recent meeting of the Wellington Education Board, and subsequent relative questions addressed to him -in Parliament, the Minister of Health (tho Hon. A. J. Stallworthy) has lost no time in reviewing the position. His main activities have been in the direction of further implementing 'the work of the school medical officers by closer and more definite co-ordination.. with the child welfare branch of the Education Department, and also the Labour Depar tmerit.

Interviewed to-day, Mr. Stallworthy outlined the general administrative position. When school medical officers, in the course of their duties, came upon instances of excessive child labour, he said, it was customary to refer them for necessary action to the child welfare branch of the Education Department to be dealt with by the local child welfare officer. Clause 1., section 29, of the Infants Act, 1908, he pointed out, regulates for children street trading and, employment for the purpose of public entertainment. Section 13 of the Child Welfare Act, 1925, provides that on the complaint of any constable or of any child welfare officer that a child is neglected, indigent, delinquent, not under proper control, or living in an environment detrimental to its physical dr^ moral well-being, any Justice may issue a summons addressed to any person having tho custody of the child requiring him to appear before a Children's Court,'-either with or without the child, in order that tho child may be dealt with in accordance with the provisions of the Act. WHAT AWARDS PRESCRIBE. Tho Minister cited other specific provisions in awards, recommendations, agreements, etc., made under the Industrial Conciliation and Arbitration Act against the harmful employment of children. The Wellington (twentyfive miles radius) Dairy Employees (Drivers or Distributors) Award states: "Drivers shall not allow any boy or youth on their carts, or allow them to assist in the delivery of milk." The Wellington City Council's Dairy -Employees Award states: "Youths, in the proportion of one to three adult workers .employed in the depot, may be employed in the depot, if not under eighteen years of age, at tho following weekly rates of pay, namely: Up to twenty years of age, £2 15s per week;' twenty to twenty-one years of age, £3 10s per week." Tho Shops and Offices Amendment Act, 1927, states: "No shop assistant shall be employed in connection with the business of any shop before' the hour of 3 o 'clock in the morning in the case of milkmen or before the hour of 4 o'clock in the morning in the case of butchers or bakers, or before the hour of 7 o'clock in the morning in any other case," and that "no boy or girl under the age of sixteen years shall be employed as aforesaid before the hour of 7 o'clock in the morning." Where there is no definite contract of employment, however, as between a parent and child, it is usual! for action to be taken under section 13 of the Child Welfare Act, referred to above. Section 45 of the. Child Welfare Act states that the Governor-General may from time to time, by Order-in-Couneil, make regulations regulating the employment of children (whether inmates of an institution under the Act or not) in street trading and places of public entertainment, and also regulating and restricting the attendance of children at places of entertainment. HOURS AND CONDITIONS. Further legislation has been under the consideration of the Child Welfare Department for some time with the object of giving a more comprehensive definition of the hours and conditions of child labour. The Minister said that an attempt was made in 1928----by the school medical officers to elucidate the standard of health and the environmental conditions of school children in certain districts. Groups of schools were selected representing children of coalminers,- bush timbermill workers, and dairy farmers in thriving communities and in remote country areas. Children . attending twenty-five schools in New Zealand were examined and the homes of 476 children were visited. School progress was retarded in children of coalminers 12 per cent.; timber mill workers, 14 per cent.; farmers in thriving areas, 21 per cent.; in remote farming areas, 11.5 per cent.; share-milkers, 26 per cent/ In the third group (thriving fanning communities), with 21 per cent, retardates, 25 per cent, had less than ten hours' sleep; 19 per cent, had more than three hours' work. In the fifth group (sharermilkers), with 26 per cent, retardates, 24 per cent. had less than ton hours' sleep; 18 per cent. had more than three hours' work. It is remarked by the school medical . officer that the amount of work done outside school hours would appear to have more effect on school progress than on nutrition. Though children who do work before and after school hours do not compare' unfavourably in development with others, their nervous system would not appear to be in as good a state, for retardation in school work is more pronounced, and a common remark of teachers is that such children show signs of fatigue in schoolindeed, in some cases, actually fall asleep. ,