SLAVERY IN JAPAN.
Japan intends remodelling her factory system, and will put an end to the employment of young children 12 and 15 hours a day, in order to step I threatened physical deteriorating I of the Japanese people. ; I . Mr Yoshikatsu ivaiayama, of the Department of Agriculture and Commerce of Japan, was recently in America, en route for England and Germany, where he will study the factory systorus on behalf of the Mikado’s government. Speaking of his mission, Mr Katayama said tlio Imperial Government has been forced to the conclusion that Japan is ton prodigal of the lives of its workers and under the untrammelled factory \ system, which has been the outgrowth of recent years of swift industrial development, the whole physical fibre of the Japanese people has become threatened with deterioration. “The common limit of labour in Japanese mills,” sjjjcl Mr Katayama, “is 15 and even 1G hours a day, seven days a. week. There arc so many poor people in Japan who are willing to work any number of hours for a living wage that the manufacturers themselves, never would limit hours ,qf labour,. nor take precautions to guard- the health of their, employees.
“The Government lias taken the first step by passing a law designed to relieve the workers. That clause of the. law prohibiting the employment of children under twelve years will not become effective for two years. The law further says that children under fifteen and women must not work longer than twelve hours a day. Fifteen and sixteen a day for both these classes, has boon the rule.”
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Stratford Evening Post, Volume XXXI, Issue 24, 13 September 1911, Page 6
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265SLAVERY IN JAPAN. Stratford Evening Post, Volume XXXI, Issue 24, 13 September 1911, Page 6
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