LIFE IN THE LAUNDRY. PuHLISHED AND SoLD BY THE FABIAN SOCIETY. PRICE ONE PENNY. LONDON: THji: FABIAN SociETY, 3 CLEMENT's INN, STRAND, W.C. ]ULY 1902. LIFE I J THE LAUNDRY. THI< laundry industry has during the last few years undergone a remarkable and rapid economic development. Formerly a purelydomestic industry, organized upon the economic principle of one woman one wash-tub, it is now a typical, modern, machine "bu ine s," characterized by aggregation of workers in one building under one head, subdivision of labor and the u e of labor-saving machinery. All over the country, but more particularly in London, there has been a rapid multiplication of large laundry companies and syndicates, "certain of which own as many as a dozen or more fine, well equipped steam-laundries, filled with the latest ingenious invention in labor-saving machinery, and organized into 'departmeuts,' in which the division of labor is at lea t as marked a feature as in the majority of non-textile factories. In such cases a single shirt will pass through seven or eight different machines in the process of ironing alone. In place of the elderly married woman or widow 'wa her,' we find 5killed engineers in charge of a shedful of machinery still called the wash-house, while scores of girls and young women from thirteen upwards' tend' the various kinds of ironing machines with exactly the same preci ion and routine as those in any other factory. Even in those departments where machinery is not required, for instance, the sorters with their staff of ' markers,' the dryers who fill and empty with almo t automatic regularity the series of drying-closets through which hot air is driven by propulsiou fans, the labor is organized and regulated as in an ordinary factory."* This economic reyolution has taken place during the past eight or ten years. According to the Census Report for the County of London, 1901 (Cd. 875-1902), the number of men and lads engaged in laundry and washing service was 3,175, of whom 1,309 worked at home; the number of women and girl was 47,362, of whom w,4o8 worked at home; of the males 723 and 16,223 of the females were under 20 years of age. The steam laundries on the register in the London district for 1901 were 216, and the hand laundries ~7R. Insanitary Conditions. This rapid development of laundry work from a hand to a machine industry has been accomp:mied by many of the evils which have attended the same process in other trades. Some of the most important are those which are inseparable from the use of premiseunsuited to the uses of the industry. The enterprising laundry proprietor,, alive to the profit-making possibilities of machinery, is not disposed to wait until he posse se suitable premises before beginning • Annual Repo1t of H.M. Chief Inspector of Factorie,, rgoo, p. 381. bu~iness as the proprietor of a steam laundry, and so long as sanitary conditions are a minor consideration an ordinary dwelling-house can be made to serve his purpose. Side by side with the large laundry factories described above, where the structural conditions are a regards sanitation on the whole fairly satisfactory, there is a very much larger class of laundries consisting of ordinary dwelling-houses more or less badly adapted for the purpose. "It is no uncommon thing to find a row of houses in separate occupation, the back yards of each of which is roofed in and packed with laundry machinery, all dri,·en by an engine installed at one end of the row."* "The rapid growth of the small laundry factory is a striking feature. l t seems tu be due partly to the increased cheapness of certain parts of machinery, and largely to the fact that the wage bill is thereby so much lessened." '"It is simply amazing to see the lightheartedness with which an engine, gas or steam, is introduced into what one might call the domestic circle, for in noting unguarded machinery in the house-factory laundry I have always in my mind not only the workers, but the children of the occupier, whom I have so often found watchingin a fascinated way the movements of the machines."t "The prime mover for gas or steam engine is found in a badly lighted basement and in charge of a man who knows little or nothing of the dangers or management of machinery; the fencing of the fly-wheel is in many cases inadequate, a wash-tub often serving the purpose ; other dangerous parts are equally disregarded, and it is difficult to persuade the owner that accidents may occur even with a low power."t All occupations have their special conditions prejudicial to the health 0f the workers employed therein, and it is one of the tasks of factory legislation to remove as far as possible the eYil effects of such conditions. The chief unhealthy conditions of the laundry industry are: J. Wetness of the washing room floors. 2. The presence of steam in the washing room , and also, thoughto a lesser extent, in the ironing room. 3· Heated and vitiated atmosphere of the ironing room. To counteract these conditions it is essential (a) That the floor of the washing room should consist of a properly laid impermeable material, provided with adequate means of drainage ; and (b) that the washing and ironing room should be properly ventilated. These, however, are precisely the features that are most conspicuous by their absence from many of the converted back yards and sculleries in which the clothes of most of us are washed, where the the laundress works with her head bathed in steam and her feet in water. " The badly arranged floors in even large wash-houses are a constant source of discomfort and probably ill-health to the workers. The Act requires that they should be 'drained in such a manner as to allow the water to run off freely,' but makes no provision that it should be drained off on the spot where it is discharged." ''It is not all uncommon, therefore, to find that the yellow and foul water from the row of tanks or washing machines at one end of the wash-house flows all across the tloor and over the feet of the workers before eventually reaching the drain. Jn one *Annual Report H. M. Chief Inspector of Factories, 1900, p. 380. t Annual Report of the Principal Lady Inspector of Factories, 1901, p. 178. ! Annual Report H. M. Chief Inspector of Factories, 1900, p. 380. + l.lUndry where :t c;uaract of dirty water was discharged over the feel in this man~e1 every twelve or eighteen minutes from certain patent washing machines, the oc~up1e1 triumphantly pointed out that it' flowed quite freely' to the drain on the other "de ol the shed."• But bad a the conditions in the smaller laundry factories often are, the tate of things is much worse in those factories which have not developed beyond the " workshop" stage. This will appearfrom the following quotation from the Annual Report of H. M. Principal Lady Inspector of Factories for 1899 (p. 2~7) : THE \VAsii-HOl'SE.-" Very often on entering the wash-hou e the whole place i' 'o pervaded with steam that I cannot see the workers. .\ great deal of thi~ .steam comes from the coppers, of which there are generally two or three. The prOVISIOn of hoods would to a great extent remedy matter,, but in the greater number of l'asethese are conspicuous by their absence." THE IR0:-111'\G Roo~!.-" As the provision in force in factory laundries, \iz., that .dl stoves for heating irons shall be sufficiently separated from the ironing room, Joe' not apply to the workshop laundry, it is only where the temperature is unreason:.bly high that any steps can be taken to remedy the matter. The heat of the ironingroom is largely owing to the fact that very few laundries possess drying rooms. Thus, except in summer, most of the drying is done overhead in the ironing room. Thi' leads to inadequate ventilation, for most laundry proprietors consider shut "indow< .tn indispensabie l'Ondition of drying indoors. "What" ith the un ·creened stove, the damp clothes overhead, the tightly clm.eJ windows streaming with moisture, caused by want of ventilation, the room crowded with the legal quantity of women, perspiring, sneezing, and coughing, a &mall ironinglaundry room is not in working hours a very attractive place. But at dinner time it i~ less attractive still. The uninitiated would naturally imagine that during the women' · absence for meals the windows and doors would be thrown up and the room' thoroughly aired. Experience unfortunately proves that this is seldom the ase. Frequent dinner-time inspections have taught me what to expect. At dinner-time the 1roning room becomes a furnace. The stove is heated to the greatest extent, and the windows and doors are particularly tightly closed, and drying proceeds under condi· tions alleged to be advantageous from the laundress's point of view, but frequently not so." The small hand laundries, especially those in the Soho district of London, receive special attention in the Annual Report of th~ Principal Lady Inspector of Factories for 1qoo (p. 385) : ,,The owners of many of these laundries are or French or I tali an origin. Theyinvest their small capital in the rent of a house or part of one, sub-let the uppe1 rooms, and devote the lower to their trade. They appear to start with the impressionthat any house is good enough for a laundry, given a fair supply of water, and sho" no con ideration whatever for the health of their workers or the number of hour they.tre employed. The front room on the ground floor, originally intended for a shop, forms in most cases the principal ironing room. . . The wa h-house is plal'ed in the basement room, more often like a cellar than a room. In one, the worst of any, it was not more than six feet in height, and ventilated only by the door leading up to the house. The place was black with accumulated dirt. The floor was covered with water. A gas-jet in one corner gave the only light. A copper in another corne1 poured out steam for which there wa no means of escape, and which was so thick "' to hide the two workers almost completely from view. The temperature was ,o high that the perspiration streamed off their fa es. This was, of course, an exceptional , nothing is so striking to the Inspector as the spectacle of numbers of young girls from If years old and upwards all legally employed at IO or I I o'clock at night in the ordinary factory labor of tending machinery. Passing at night from one factorylaundry to another, and finding the young calender-feeders employed in their mechanical task of "feeding" the large steam-heated, power-driven, ironing roller> with the damp linen to be ironed (a cloud of steam rising as each "piece" is passed through), it is impossible not to speculate on the effect of the work and the hours on these young girls. One can only feel surprise that accidents are not more numerous when one realizes that the slightest carelessness or inattention may result in the fingers or hand being drawn between the hot cylinders, and when one considers how easily such in attention may arise in the case of over·tired young workers. In few, if any other industry, are the daily working-hours so long. "Working and standing in the steaming hot atmosphere of a calender-room, from 8 a.m. till 9 or IO p.m. all the week, with the exception of one day, is an arduou' strain on the young constitution."t The irregularity of the periods of emiJloyment makes the detection of illegal hours exceedingly difficult. In a factory or workshopthe work begins and ends at a stated time, and the working-day must be within the round of the clock. If the work begins at 6 a.m. it must end at 6 p.m. ; if it begins at 7 a.m. it must end at 7 p.m. The period of employment, z·.e., whether the hours are to be from 6 to 6 or from 7 to 7, etc., must be fixed beforehand, and when once fixed cannot be altered without written notice to the Factory Inspector, and to the workers, and even then not oftener, unless in exceptional circumstances, than once in three months. In laundries the round of the clock rule does not apply. Provided the hours are specified in a notice exhibited in the laundry before the day's work begins, the period of employment may vary from day to day, and may vary for each individual worker. Under these conditions it j, • In certain exceptional industries, '·K·· blast furnaces, a limited amount of nightwork is allowed for male young persons. t Annual Report H M. Chief Inspector of Factories, Igoo, p. 38;:. 7 obvious that the legal maximum number of hours must often be exceeded, and the fact escape detection. It is, indeed, difficult for the laundry-keepers to understand the law which they must observe. As Miss Paterson says : "It is easy for even a person of limited experience to understand such an instruction as that from Monday to Friday no one will be employed before 8 a.m. or after 8 p.m., and that the limitations on Saturday are 8 a.m. and 4 p.m., but the laundry regulations with rigidity here and laxity there are not understood."* The freedom given to spread the number of working- hours over the whole day is without parallel in our factory legislation. "Under the present law, allowing two hours for meals, women can be kept continuously at work from 8 a.m. until 12 (16 hours) on two days in every week throughout the year ; on two other days in the week from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. (12 hours), and on Mondays and Saturdays (the usual short days) from 10 a.m. to 8 p.m. (10 hours), and from 8 a.m. until noon (4 hours) respectively. And this without overtime.'~ ("Law and the Laundry," Nz"netee1lth Century, February, 1897.) In the matter of long hours it is questionable whether such specialand imperfect legislation has not made the lot of the laundress worse instead of better. Formerly, it was the custom of the trade to regard work after 8 p.m. as overtime. Now, overtime is onlyreckoned after the maximum of sixty hours per week has been worked. Counting overtime, it is possible to arrange the hours of labor in a laundry during any ten weeks in the year, so as to make this table legal : Monday from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. Tuesday , 8 , 8 , Wednesday ,. 8 , 12 midnight. Thursday 11 8 , 12 , Friday... 11 8 ,1 12 , Saturday , 8 11 12 noon. Nearly the whole of the work of a laundry is done standing, and the long hours spent in this position, often in surroundings the reverse of sanitary, amidst a heated and damp atmosphere, render the laundress especially liable to pulmonary complaints, varicose veins and ulcerated legs. Uterine displacement, a terrible affection, which embitters the lives of far more women than is generally known, is particularly prevalent amongst laundresses. Miss Deane, one of H.M. Inspectors of Factories, from whose valuable report on laundries, published in the annual report of the Principal Lady Inspector of Factories for 1900 (p. 384), much of the information contained in this Tract is taken, investigated the effects of the present conditions of labor on the health of the laundry women. She examined the records of the number, ages, diseases, and occupations of the patients at the Isleworth and Wandsworth and Clapham Infirmaries, and extracted the following table, which speaks for itself. * Report, etc., 1901. p. 178. TABLE A. ISLE\\ ORTH INFIRMARY (iNCLUD ES ACTON, CHIS\\"ICK, .BH.ENTFORD). c i:ll)'-"' Q) "' " .0 -=~ ~ ·E :§ ·2 E ... " "' c I 0 ~ -c.. -5 0 J J ..c: ::: ::Sa 0 0 z 0.. Vl8 .... ~ d: 1898 Laundresses ... 1 in 6 6 1 in 10 9 Women other than laundresse li9 1 in 25 7 1 in 25 I899 Laundresses ... 79 I 3 I in 6 9 r in 9 Women other than laundresses 2I 8 I in 3I II r in 20 --------I TABLE B. V\'ANDS\\'ORTH AND CLAPHAM INFIRMARY (INCLUDING BATTERSEA). ~ .0 s ::: z I899 Laundresses 36 I in 6 Women other than laundresses I,I 7I so 1 in 2 3 1900 Laundresses Women other than laundresses I99I 1,127 I 27 +I I in 7 I in 27 16 +9 I2 69 1-1 21 I in II 1 in I6 +5 II in 5 l in 22 1 in 19 I29 I 111 9 I in 16 21 1 in 9 I8 1 in II I in r6 I33 I in 9 59 1 in I9 Miss Vines, another of the Factory Inspectors, points out :-" A danger to the health of the women employed in wash-houses appears to me to be the close proximity in which new laundries are built. It not infrequently occurs that the windows of one wash-house are only a few feet away from those of the other next door, the natural result of such an arrangement being that when steam is forced through the outlets of one wash-house, it often merely passes in at the windows of the adjacent laundry. Another danger, onlylikely to arise when a laundry business is carried on in a dwelling- house, is the admitted presence of disease.''* *Report of H.M. Chief Inspector of Factories, IgoI, p. 178. q Exempted Laundries. The provisions of the Factory Act with respect to laundries, inadequate as they are, have only a limited application. Two important classes of laundries are exempt altogether from the operation of the Act by the following clause : "Nothing in this Act shall apply to any laundry in which the only persons employed are " (a) Inmates of any prison, reformatory or industrial school, or other institution for the time being subject to an inspection under any Act other than the Factory Act; or "(b) Inmates of an institution conducted in good faith for religious or charitable purposes; or "(c) Members of the same family dwelling there, or in which not more than two persons dwelling elsewhere are employed." Institution Laundries. The Factory Biil of I 89 5 contained provisions for the regulationof these establishments. Speaking on the second reading of the Bill, Mr. Asquith said: "V{e cannot concede that they (the institutions) are entitled without inspection to have machinery which is dangerous in its character or operation, or to employ persons for a larger number of hours than the Factory Act allows." The proposedregulations, however, met with the keenest opposition from the Irish members on whose vote Mr. Asquith was dependent, and had to be dropped. In the Government Bill of 1901 another attempt was made to bring a modified form of inspection to bear on the institution laundries, but the same opposition was renewed and with the same success. It is difficult to see by what arguments the exemption of the institution laundries can be justified. Many of these laundries are practically business establishments competing freely in the openmarket, and though it has been urged in Parliament and elsewhere that they do not work for profit, it cannot be denied that many of them make large sums of money, as is shown by the following fig;ures taken from the Annual Charities' Register for 1901 Income Income Name of House. from from other Laundry. sources. £ £ Magdalen Home, Edgbaston ... 631 237 Home of Good Shepherd, Malvern . . . 703 287 Asylum for Penitent Females, Dublin 1,046 225 Edgar Home, Belfast ... 1,132 144 Edinboro' Industrial Home for Fallen Women 1,649 158 Magdalen Asylum, Edinburgh 5,847 493 It is impossible to deny that establishments such as these are serious competitors in the laundry industry; and there is justice in the demand of the laundry proprietor that charitable and religious institutions should obey the law which he has to obey, that they 10 should, so lo speak, "play the game." It is, of course, most important that the charitable work of rescue should not be subject to interference, and that the discipline of the establishments should be maintained, but it is hard to see why this should be incompatible with an occasional visit of a woman inspector to the laundry for the purpose of satisfying herself that the conditions are sanitary, the machinery properly fenced, and the hours of work not excessive. Nor can it be said that the conditions of work in these laundries are of such a nature as to render inspection unnecessary as well as undesirable. " That there is need for inspection, in some cases, 1 have no doubt. Great complaint was made to me of a religious community, where workers were kept for 19 hours at work at times, but, of course, 1 had no power of entry, and could do nothingin the matter. The competition of such places, where even the laundry hours are ex· ceeded, is a source of complaint to the law-abiding proprietors of laundries." (AnnuaI Report of Chief Inspector of Factories, 1898.) "Again, I must record that the exemption of the present domestic laundries and charitable institutions causes greatdissatisfaction to the other laundry proprietors. They complain bitterly of the competition of places which are allowed to work 'all hours of the night,' and T must say I think they are fully justified in their complaint." (Annual Report of Chief Inspectors of Factories, 1900, p. 387.) In addition to these statements of the Government officials, we have the testimony of the Rev. Arthur Brinckman, who was Assistant Chaplain at St. Andrew's Home, Edinburgh, Chaplain at St. AgnesHospital for the Fallen, and Chairman of the Church Mission to the Fallen. He says that in some of the homes of his acquaintance the hours of work are " irregular and long, especially in the laundry. I have known girls far advanced in consumption in the laundry working long after they ought to have been elsewhere, or in hospital. Self-supporting homes need extra inspection, the temptation being to overwork the girls." "After more than 30 years' close connection with hospitals, sisterhoods, homes and refuges, J feel the need of inspection most strongly. . . . One objection that has been raised against inspection is that the girls would be unsettled for a day or two. It is made in all seriousness, but I think it is not worth considering." At a meeting of managers of charitable institutions of a religious character, held at Westminster in 1902, State inspection of such laundries was generally approved, but they asked that men inspectors only should be employed. This suggestion must be negatived. Lady inspectors who have gained experience in inspecting commercial laundries are required. Much may be learnt in this connection from the example of France, where inspection of religious houses has been enforced by the GoYernment since I 892. The following are some of the evils which were reported by the inspector when the work was begun : " Children from seven to eight xears old were kept at work from 5 a.m. to 5 p.m. Children over twelve years old worked till their task was finished. No instruction was given to the children, and owing to the division of labor, which kept them employed in some such detail as the sewing of a button-hole, they were unable to become proficient even in the trade which they practised. Women frequently left the convent< between the ages of twenty and thirty without being able to read or write, and incapable of earning their livelihood." (Report of Industrial Law Committee on Laundries.) 1 I The need of inspection in France is proved by the fact that in 1899 there were 4,429 infractions of the law, 924 of which related to the duration of work. There has, however, been a great improvement since the introduction of Government supervision. Exempted Smaller Laundries.* "Why may clothes be washed under dirty conditions next door, where only two women are employed, while I, who employ three, must set my house in order and conform to regular hours?" and "'Why may a man work his own children harder than other folks?" These are questions frequently put to the Factory Inspector, and are difficult to answer. The unhealthy state of certain of these small laundries has been described above, and the evils of insanitary conditions and excessive hours of labor are as great, if not greater, in these places as in any other class of laundries. The Report of the Inter-Departmental Committee on the employment of school children contains the following instructive passage: "Some of the very worst cases of overworking little girls of which we have heard occurred in the small laundries, which are exempt from the provisions of the Factory Acts." The exemption has led to an evasion of the law which bears unjustly not only on competitors but on ratepayers. It has become a common practice to keep only two workers on the premises, and to send the others with the "washing" into a publicwash-house, thus competing at the expense of the ratepayers, and to the exclusion of those for whom the wash-house was intended, with those employers who are obliged to conform to the provisions of the Factory Acts. How to Improve our Laundries. We have seen that the chief evils connected with the present state of the laundry industry are-(1) Insanitary conditions; (2) Excessive and irregular hours of labor; (3) Exemption of institution laundries, and laundries in which not more than two persons dwellingelsewhere are employed. The insanitary conditions are, as a rule, dependent on the use of premises which were never intended for laundries. In the comparatively few cases where the laundry was built for laundry work the conditions are usually good; but where, as is generally the case, the laundry is a hastily converted dwelling-house or part of a house, the conditions are, as has been shown, often very bad. To remedythese conditions a more energetic administration of the present law is required, as well as fresh legislation to deal with special points. The duty of enforcing sanitation rests upon the Factory Inspectorif steam or other power be used in the laundry; otherwise it rests upon the local sanitary authority. The Inspector, however, may act in default of the sanitary authority should the latter neglect its duty. The staff ofFactory Inspectors is, as is generally admitted, ridiculously inadequatet, and, without a material increase in the staff, improve * Laundries in which not more than two persons dwelling elsewhere are employed. t The total number of Factory Inspectors, including assistants, is 141. Only seven of these are women. 12 ments in the power-laundries will be but slowly secured. Women inspectors are particularly wanted for this work. The sanitaryauthorities in many districts have unfortunately not evinced an) remarkable degree of zeal in carrying out their duties under the Factory Acts; but lately, and more particularly since the passing of the 1901 Act, greater activity has been displayed, and several authorities have appointed special workshop inspectors, male and female. But though much more could be done under the existing law than actually is done, further legislative powers are required. At present, the occupiers of a laundry where power is used can be compelled to provide a fan or ''other means of a proper construction'' for regulating the temperature in every ironing room, and for carrying away steam in every wash-house in the laundry. He must sufficiently eparate all stoves for heating irons from any ironing room, and must not use gas-irons that emit any noxious fumes. These provision:. should be extended to hand-laundries. The bad effects of noxious fumes, a steam-laden atmosphere and an excessively high temperature do not depend upon the use of mechanical power, and there is no good reason why provisions for preventing these conditions should be confined to places where power is used. The I 89 5 Act has a special provision for floor-drainage in power-laundries; but section 8 of the 1901 Act," which applies to laundries, will probably be found more effective. It is more than doubtful, however, whether there i · any statutory power at the present time to deal adequately with that fertile source of ill-health, the wet floor, that is so constant a feature in many, probably most, wash-houses. It is not sufficient to providestands. When they are not fastened to the floor they are a source of danger, especially when machinery is near. The workers are liable to trip over them or catch their feet in broken pieces. Even when they are firmly fixed they are usually Yery slippery and offer a horrible nest for all the foul stuff which dirty water in a laundry collects. The Act should order that the floor should be constructed of proper material, that the fall and the means of drainage should be efficient, and, most important of all, that proyision should be made for draining off the water at the spot where it is discharged (see page 3) The practice of drying clothes by hanging them out over cords suspended from the ceiling of the drying-room is unhealthy and should be prohibited. Better provision should be made for cleanliness iu hand-laundries. In power-laundries all walls and ceilings must be limewashed once at least every fourteen months, or, if painted, they must be washed down with soap and water. This provision should apply also to hand-laundries. Further, it is essential that the workers should not be allowed to eat their meals in laundries. The surroundings are worse than in many factories, and separate rooms for the consumption of meals should be provided. * This section provides that: "In every factory or workshop, or part thereof, in "hich any process is carried on which renders the floor liable to be wet to such an extent that the wet is capable of being remo,ed by drainage, adequate means shall he provided for draining off the wet." 13 Long Hours. The simplest and most satisfactory method of obviating the long and irregular periods of employment is to extend the definition of "factory" and "workshop" to include laundries. At present a laundry is a" factory" or a "workshop" (the distinction depending on the use of mechanical power) in so far as regards" sanitary provisions, safety, accident, the affixing of notices and abstracts, and the matters to be specified in such notices (so far as they apply to laundries), notice of occupation of a factory or workshop, powers of inspectors, fines, and legal proceedings for any failure to complywith the provisions of this section* and education of children." In all matters relating to hours of work, however, laundries are not factories or workshops, but are regulated by the special provisions quoted on page 5· The distinction is purely artificial and should be removed. Practically, laundries are as much factories or workshop· as dye-works, and all that is wanted is to make them such technically by Act of Parliament. This course would at once bring into forct t he following provisions: I. Prohibition of Sunday work. 2. Prohibition of night-work and overtime for young persons. 3· No child or young person would be employed without a medical certificate of fitness. 4· Definite times for meals would be specified. S· Provision for a Saturday half-holiday. 6. Period of employment would be arranged on the round of the clock rule. This provision would make it an offence for the laundry to be kept at work after a certain fixed hour, and the working of illegal hours would be easy of detection, instead of, as at present, extremely difficult. Another evil connected with the laundry trade is the excessive hours that collecting and delivering boys and girls are employed. It is quite a common thing for these boys and girls to be employed for ninety hours per week. The Factory Act provisions for non-textile factories would not, even if extended to laundries, afford any relief for this excessive employment. The hours under these provisions are limited only for those employed "in" a factory, and it would probably be held that such young persons are excluded. What is wanted is a clause defining these young persons and definitely including them in a limitation of hours. Lastly, the provisions of the Factory Act should be made applicable to all laundries carried on for purposes of gain.. In the case of the institution laundries this should be done with all due regard to their special conditions. For instance, inspections should only be made by women inspectors. But no laundry should remain exemptfrom the legislative regulations which experience has shown to be necessary to protect the health and well-being of the laundry workers. Several unsuccessful attempts have been made to secure these provisions for laundries. Trade opposition has been too strong for the • Sect. 103 of the 1901 Act; the section dealing with laundries. q Factory Act reformers. It has been urged that owing to the special conditions of the industry, it would be impossible for employers to work regular hours throughout the week. The "washing" does not arrive at the laundry, as a rule, till Monday afternoon, and must be returned on Friday. Hence the necessity of working young girlstill IO, I 1, or even 12 at night. This argument exalts a domestic custom to the dignity of a law of nature. There is nothinginherent in the constitution of the universe which demands that dirty linen should be collected on Monday, washed on Tuesday, dried on Wednesday, ironed on Thursday, and sent home clean on Friday. There is no reason in the nature of things why families with a normal supply of linen should not have their " washing" called for on a certain day of the week, and returned on the same day in the following week. Most of the large steam laundries in London adopt this rule, and there is no doubt that its general adoption would be welcomed by a considerable section of the trade. .As a leading laundry proprietor has expressed it : "Why should the trade be disorganized for the sake of the one-shirt brigade?" As to the" uncertain" nature of the work, it must be remembered that the laundry industry has now reached in many places a high degreeof organization. "With the advent of machine1y and subdivision of labor, the whole character of the industry has changed, the • uncen~inty' so much dwelt on as a peculiarity of laundry work practically di appears. The 'capacity' of each machine, and of the whole plant, is known to a fraction ; the amount of work that can be dealt with per hour can be accurately calculated, often more so than in many other factories. . . . This change in the economic conditions of the indu try is of great importance from the point of view of legislative regulation. It is impossible not to be truck by the contrast afforded by the spectacle of •.he steam laundry full of labor-sa\ ing machinery engaged mainly on contract work, with eyery modern deYice for regulating and organizing the 'output,' the capacity of each machine and department of which is perfectly gauged, and that of the dressmaker or milliner employing only hand labor, often very highly skilled, dependent on mere passing whim or fancy of a fleeting season, struggling with 'uncertainties' and 'rushes' and other difficulties as great as any with which the laundry has to cope, and yet successfully complying with regulations which the factory (for uch it practically is) could often more easily conform to."* It is refreshing to note that the bogey of foreign competition, which has hitherto loomed large over all projects of factory reform, cannot be raised in this connection. Howe\'er anxious the housewife may be to see her laundry basket brought home on Fridayevening, she is not likely to send her dirty linen across the Channel to be washed. It is said, indeed, that the gilded youth of London can only be satisfied with a Paris-dressed shirt, and that his Parisian comrade repays the compliment, but this international reciprocity is a trivial matter. It has been objected that increased regulation would drive the trade from the smaller laundries into the large factory laundry. A more correct statement is that it would tend to transfer the trade from the less capable to the more capable employers, and it has yet to be shown that thi is a process to be regretted. Even the imperfect legislation of the past has had this effect. The Chairman of the • Anni1al Report of H. :\I. Chief Inspector of Factories, 1900, p. 382. Eastbourne Sanitary Steam Laundry Company told his shareholders on 2 sth January, I 897' that" the new Factory Act prevented the hands working so long as they used to do, and the directors had been obliged to provide machinery to enable them to do the work in less time."* It is only the stupidity of many laundry proprietors which prevents them from perceiving how beneficent is the compulsion of the law, even from the purely business standpoint. To quote Miss Paterson once more," The maximum of inconvenience and confusion seems to be reached in many of these cottage homes, in which the structure also involves methods of working so extravagant that the unnecessary expense could only be disregarded in a business so profit- able as laundry work. The little dark, narrow entrance passage blocked continually by baskets and heaps of soiled linen, the dark kitchen wash-house crowded with machinery, with proper lighting, Yentilation and means of removing steam almost impossible to secure, the condition of flooring required by the Act, only obtained by constant mending, all these tend to delay work and workers and so increase the cost of the business."t In fact, the sympathy of the public for the poor widow has been exploited for the benefit of pro- prietors who do not even know their own business, and the British housewife's laundry bill is run up to maintain a cruel and wasteful system. Tt is time that an end were put to such a state of things in the name alike of humanity and of business common-sense. • Quoted from" Industrial Democracy," by S. and B. Webb, p. 7 27. t Report of Principal Lady Inspector of Factories, 1901, p. 178. AUTHORITIES. Annual Reports of H. M. Chief Inspector of Factories, I895-190I. '' Law and the Laundry," Ni11etemth Century, February, 1897. Report of Industrial Law Com- mittee on Laundries. "What can be done by Legislation to Improve the Condi- tions of Laundries?" Women's htdustria! News, December, 1900. DangerousT.·ades, edited by T. Oliver ; Murray, 1902. 25s. Trade journals. Lazmd•oyRecord, etc. Eastbourne Sanitary Steam Laundry Company told his shareholders on 2 sth January, I 897' that" the new Factory Act prevented the hands working so long as they used to do, and the directors had been obliged to provide machinery to enable them to do the work in less time."* It is only the stupidity of many laundry proprietors which prevents them from perceiving how beneficent is the compulsion of the law, even from the purely business standpoint. To quote Miss Paterson once more," The maximum of inconvenience and confusion seems to be reached in many of these cottage homes, in which the structure also involves methods of working so extravagant that the unnecessary expense could only be disregarded in a business so profit- able as laundry work. The little dark, narrow entrance passage blocked continually by baskets and heaps of soiled linen, the dark kitchen wash-house crowded with machinery, with proper lighting, Yentilation and means of removing steam almost impossible to secure, the condition of flooring required by the Act, only obtained by constant mending, all these tend to delay work and workers and so increase the cost of the business."t In fact, the sympathy of the public for the poor widow has been exploited for the benefit of pro- prietors who do not even know their own business, and the British housewife's laundry bill is run up to maintain a cruel and wasteful system. Tt is time that an end were put to such a state of things in the name alike of humanity and of business common-sense. • Quoted from" Industrial Democracy," by S. and B. Webb, p. 7 27. t Report of Principal Lady Inspector of Factories, 1901, p. 178. AUTHORITIES. Annual Reports of H. M. Chief Inspector of Factories, I895-190I. '' Law and the Laundry," Ni11etemth Century, February, 1897. Report of Industrial Law Com- mittee on Laundries. "What can be done by Legislation to Improve the Condi- tions of Laundries?" Women's htdustria! News, December, 1900. DangerousT.·ades, edited by T. Oliver ; Murray, 1902. 25s. Trade journals. Lazmd•oyRecord, etc. ment of itE Rules and the following can be obtained from the Secretary, e.t the Fabian Office, 3 Clement's Inn, London, W.O. FABIANISM AND THE EMPIRE: A Manifesto. Edited by BERNARD SHAW. 1s. post free. FA B IAN E S SAY S IN S 0 C I A L I S M. (35th Thousand.) Paper cover, t/-; plain cloth, 2/-, post free from the Secretary. 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