The Star. MONDAY. AUGUST 3. 1908. SWEATING.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 9304, 3 August 1908, Page 2

The Star. MONDAY. AUGUST 3. 1908. SWEATING.

111 recent years no serious charge lias been, brought against New Zealand employers of "sweating" their workpeople, at any rate not in the sense in which the word is commonly understood in the largo centres of industry in Europe and America. The evil is grievous enough at Home, and that it is so was made quite apparent at tlio Fan-Anglican Congress, that great gathering of the Christian philanthropists of the wo-rld which met last month in London, and discussed the great questions of the day as they affect the Church and religion. A section of the Congress discussed sweating and its cure, and brought to bear upon the subject much earnestness as well as intellect, for it is one of vast importance to the man to whose heart is dear the work of advancing social reform. Several proposals for the cure of sweating were made, and all received their share of consideration, hut the most important was that submitted by the Board of Trade arbitrator, ivho urged the establishment of "Wages Boards. It is interesting to remark that this proposal was almost equivalent to the establishment of something like the Arbitration Court as we know it in New Zeaalnd. In detail, of course, there would b,e a difference, but the work done would he much tho same. The duties of the "Wages Board* would be to fix the rate oi wages to be paid, and any employer who paid lc&s Mould be liable to penalties. The critic-ism levelled at the proposal was not unkindly, but there were some critic* who feared that the fixing of wages at a certain level by law would have the result of driving the industries most affected to countries where similar restrictions were not in force. lhe gentleman who originated the proposaJ had no such tear, and instanced the success of the Arbitration Courts— ■ which, he said, were simply^ Wages BoaTds in the sense proposed— in .New Zealand! and Australia. Against that success. was set up the fear that the miserable underpaid woman in Britain would lose more than she would gain by tho proposed reform. It was men- | tionetl that New Zealand and Australia were territories remote from Europe, and that they had a double protection in their distance from lands with a large supply of labour of a low standard, and in their high tariffs on imported goods. Moreover, they had not to contend with the difficulties created by the steady immigration of poor aliens with a, low standard of living. It was emphasised that it was among such immigrants that the worst examples of sweating in. London were to bo found, and in those trades in which hand labour was vainly attempting to compete with machinery. From outside the Congress came proposals to decrease the supply of unskilled- immigrants, a decrease which, it was believed, would have the result of enabling the unskilled labour already in the country to obtain better remuneration for its worK. Tho. decrease, it was suggested. could be accomplished by taking steps to check the immigration of aliens with a low standard of living, and that could be done by a strict enforcement of the law that still existed but had been allowed to become a dead letter. Another proposal was to extend the demand for skilled labour, and so direct to skilled industries some part of tho unskilled workers, thus raising their status in the social scale. Germany, it was quoted, had done this by her scientific tariff ; but it was futile to hope lor the putting down of sweating in Britain while the tariff there permitted the free entrance of goods produced abroad by sweated labour. "Without a tariff framed to dam out the products of foreign sweated industries, "Wages Boards could scarcely hope to succeed, but with such a tariff the Boards would be welcomed by ail who sympathised with the weak and helpless worker. The subject was exhaustively discussed both inside and" outside the Congress, and the prominence given to the tariff question as a reforming factor may perhaps have the effect of inducing a Govern- , ment that was not afraid to introduce the Licensing Bill and the old age pension scheme to turn its attention to * the certainly cad condition of the help- j less women and children' who toil for less than daily bread in sweated industries. \