WELL-BEING OF THE WORKER

Evening Star, Issue 17927, 24 March 1922, Page 6

WELL-BEING OF THE WORKER

FACTORY AMENITIES. New concern for the happiness of tho worker in British industries is illustrated by the activities of the Industrial Welfare Society, formed in accordance with wartime ideals, and still “going strong.” Esprit do corps in industrial concerns is what the society has set itself to create, and it is rapidly succeeding (says a British paper). Scattered throughout the country there aro already more than a thousand welfare workers in factories and workshops, which must he considered a largo number when it is remembered that the organisation was founded only three years ago. Their duties arc, on broad lines, to improve in general and in detail tho conditions in which work is done and to superintend the organisation of pastimes. From employers and employed alike tho society has received strong support. It is not concerned with dividends and wages, or output' end hours. In factory and workshop the welfare worker Interviews applicants for posts, studies his or her general health after appointment, arranges such matters as tho supply of medicaments, the stocking of tho canteen, tho nroduction of a bouse magazine, and undertakes tho visiting of sick members of tho staff. The society also does much work in advising firms as to their welfare schemes, and to this end 3,000 establishments wore visited last year.

At the invitation of the society a visit was paid recently to a, largo biscuit factory' in London where welfare work might be studied at first hand. All the work rooms are lofty and well ventilated, and there is plenty of light. The workers themselves, of whom the bulk are young men and women, wear overalls of‘spotless white. Two largo dining rooms are provided for their use where rooked meals can bo bought at very low charges, a meal of hot meat with vegetables followed bv a portion of pudding costing llixl. Hot soup and a roll can be got for 2d. and there is a largo oven where food that the workers have brought with them can be heated. Tho tables in the dining rooms are of wood with plate-glass tops. Tho factory is surrounded bv plaving fields, and there is also a hall where dances and concerts arc held. The firm in question publishes an admirable house magazine. Tho current number of this journal runs to twenty-six pages, and is well produced and fully illustrated.