The Evening Mail. TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 28, 1876.

Oamaru Mail, Volume I, Issue 189, 28 November 1876, Page 2

The Evening Mail.

TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 28, 1876.

*" Woctfc Chinas, a>o<i » of snfc falling tlpon a Bh«u£bt txv\s pfgtfactt that which make* thousand* think.*"

Nt/nv ithatanmm: the efforts of the lion, member f«r W akai, Mr. Bb.vdsha\v, , during the last three sessions of Parliament for the introduction of liis Factories Bill to obtain legislative protection for women and children, it would appear that at the present tints in many cities the act is a dead letter. The rapidly-increasing growth of industries and factories which call into requisition the services of children of tender years, makes it a matter of obligation that the State should not only regulate the hoars and manner of employment, but also see that such laws are carried oat. The fact which was elicited bopre the Children*, Employment Commission of 1862, that it " wa3 unhappily apparent to a painful degree that against no person do the children of both sexes require protection as against their parents,"

is unfortunately not confined to Great Britain, for it is a melancholy fact that we have fathers and mothers amongst us who are prepared to sacrifice the health and strength of their offspring for a paltry pecuniary consideration. In the " Annals of British Legislation," Mr. Loxge, in speaking of the condition of things in the potteries and brick-fields, said : —" In one yard at Moxley I found a girl of twentyfour making 2,000 bricks a day, and having two girte, one fifteen, and one sixteen yeare of age, to catTy clay and lay her bricks. These girb had to carry ten tons of clay, which she used in the day, up the slippery sides of the pit from a depth of about ten yards, and over a distance of about seventy yards." Of course matters have not ai'rived at such a deplorable stage in this country, but it is a well known fact that we have children of tender ycara employed at and for such hours as are calculated to undermine the health and constitution and sow the germs of disease, leading to physical suffering and decay. Attention was called a few weeks since to repeated breaches of the Act which are allowed to take place in this town ; and although in the larger cities of the Colony the provisions are systematically burked, it is only now and again the delinquents are brought to task. The gentleman who was instrumental in t'.ie passing of the measure did not gain his end without a long and stubborn fight and determined opposition, and when the Bill became law it was hailed as a boon by all those not personally interested to the contrary. It is to be hoped then that not only in this town, but elsewhere throughout the Colony, sucli a watchful supervision will be exercised that those who have been in the habit of breaking the law with impunity will be quickly brought to task.