Successful Trial of Fight Hours a Day at Home.

Evening Star, Issue 8549, 23 June 1891, Page 4

Successful Trial of Fight Hours a Day at Home.

Mr Mark Beaufoy, M.P,, proprietor of an old-established works in Lambeth for the production of jams, pickles, and British wines, has given the eight hours’ system a trial extending over eighteen months, and has found it a decided change for the good, both of the workpeople and himself. Speaking to a contributor to the ‘ Ball Mall Gazette,’ he said “ When the business first came under my control the men were working a nominal nine hours day, but the real day was much longer. Recourse was had to overtime on the slightest provocation, and during the months of October and November over-time was the daily rule. In those months we have to get ready our British wines for Christmas consumption, and tho men used to be at work night after night till eight or nine o’clock. I have even known them leave the factory as late as eleven o’clock. When I complained of the system I was told that it was absolutely necessary; that the work could not be gotthrongh otherwise. However, I knew that it was bad for myself as well as for the men, A man who has done a reasonable day’s work is not fid to give good work at night, and if he makes the attempt his work the next morning suffers. So I put rny foot down and stopped the practice almost entirely. Overtime pay ceased with the cessation of overtime work, and at first the men took it badly. They urged that October and November had been their harvest months, and that the stoppage of overtime made a serious difference to their annual incomes. I thought there was justice in the complaint, so I raised their ordinary wages. Thus the whole of the cost fell on me. But I soon found that it was a moat profitable outlay. All the work I now paid for was good work ; previously a large percentage of it was bad work. However, all this is some years ago. Let ps get on tq the eight hours day. I first got the idea of this further reform at a meeting of gas stokera. I thought the matter over and determined to give the system a trial. This was in tho summer of 1889. M y men were then coming to work at six, leaving at eight for half an hour for breakfast, again breaking off in the middle of the morning for ten minutes for lunoh; then for an hour for dinner { and finally leaving work at five o’clock. Each of these breaks means loss of time in leaving off and picking up work, and for this loss the employer has to pay. Moreover, a man la not fit to do much good work at sixo’clook on a cold, dark morning, onan empty stomach. So I proposed that they shoqld, instead, come tq work at eight, drop the ton minutes for lunch, and work steadily till twelve, return from dinner at one o’clock and work till five. For this solid eight hours day I offered to pay the same wages as 1 had previously been paying for the broken day of nine hours and a-qnarter. AVtth regard to the Saturday half-holiday, I said that I would throw that in, so that our working week is only forty-five home. The men were delighted, and are even better pleased now they have had experience of the system. Asked how the system had worked from his side of the account, Mr Beaufoy answered most satisfactorily in every way. The men do quite as much work, if not more, than before, and the remnant of the overtime difficulty has completely disappeared. During the first full year after the introduction of the eight hours day, not a single of overtime was wqrkpd, Aqd this result was attained without any increase of staff. The only extra men I had to take on were three, for gate-porters’ and nightwatchers’ work, in order to substitute an eight * or a twelve hours shift. These facts, said Mr Beaufoy in conclusion, speak for themselves, and I cannot add to their force by any statement of my own opinion. Indeed, I am so thoroughly convinced of the success of the system that it seems to me almost superfluous to say so, I would as soon say that I believed in the truth of the multiplication table.”