WITHDRAWN Mov.1982 AN EIGHT HOURS BILL In the form of an Amendment of the Factory Acts. with further provisions for the Improvement of the conditions of labour. PUBLISHED BY THE FABIAN SOCIETY. 66 Unfettered individual competition is not a principle to which the regulation of industry may be entrusted." (The Right Honourable JOHN MORLEY, M.P., in "Life of Cobden," vol. 1, ch. xiii., p. 298.) (TWENTIETH THOUSAND. REVISED.) Price One Penny. To be obtained of the Secretary, 2L, Hyde Park Mansions, Edgware Road, N.W.; and of the Publisher, John Heywood, Deansgate and Ridgefield, Manchester, and 1, Paternoster Buildings, London. MAY, 1890. (ESTABLISHED 1883.) HE FABIAN SOCIETY consists of Socialists. THE A statement of its Principles, Rules, Conditions of Membership, etc., can be obtained from the Secretary, at 2L Hyde Park Mansions, London, N.W. Also the following publications : "FABIAN ESSAYS IN SOCIALISM." A full exposition of modern English Socialism in its latest and maturest phase. The book consists of eight monographs by G. BERNARD SHAW, SYDNEY OLIVIER, SIDNEY WEBB, WILLIAM CLARKE, HUBERT BLand, Graham WALLAS and ANNIE BESANT. The frontispiece is by WALTER CRANE. Library Edition, 6s.; or, direct from the Secretary for Cash, 4/6 (postage 4†d.) Cheap Edition, Paper cover (published by Walter Scott, 24 Warwick Lane, London), 1s.; ditto, plain cloth, 2s. At all booksellers, or post free from the Secretary for 1s. and 2s. respectively. FABIAN TRACTS. To be obtained from the Publisher, JOHN HEYWOOD, Deansgate and Ridgefield, Manchester, and I Paternoster Buildings, London; or from the Secretary at above address. No. 1.-Why are the Many Poor? 25th thousand. Is. per 100. Price 6 for Id., No. 5.-Facts for Socialists. A comprehensive survey of the distribution of income and the condition of classes in England, gathered from official returns, and from the works of well-known economists and statisticians. Authorities given for all the figures. 25th thousand. 16 pp., Id.; or 9d. per doz. No. 7.-Capital and Land. A similar survey of the distribution of property, with a criticism of the distinction sometimes set up between Land and Capital as instruments of production. 10th thousand. 16 pp., Id. ; or 9d. per doz. No. 8.-Facts for Londoners. An exhaustive collection of statistical and other information relating to the County and City of London, with suggestions for Municipal Reform on Socialist principles. 5th thousand. 56 pp., 6d. ; or 4/6 per doz. No. 9. An Eight Hours Bill in the form of an amendment of the Factory Acts, with further provisions for the improvement of the conditions of Labor. Very full notes explain the Trade Option clause and the principles and precedents on which the Bill is founded. A list of literature dealing with the question of the limitation of the hours of labor is appended. 20th thousand. 16 pp., Id. ; or 9d. per doz. No. 10.-Figures for Londoners (a short abstract of No. 8). 10th thousand. 4 pp., 6 for 1d.: Is. per 100. No. 11.-The Workers' Political Programme fully explains the politics of to-day from the working class point of view, and gives questions to put to Parliamentary candidates, with reasons for asking them. 10th thousand. 20 pp., Id.; or 9d. per doz. No. 12.-Practicable Land Nationalization. A brief statement of practical proposals for immediate reform. 20th thousand. 4 pp., 6 for Id., or Is. per 100. No. 13.-What Socialism Is. A short exposition of the aim of Socialists. 30th thousand. 4 pp., 6 for 1d.. or Is. per 100. No. 14.-The New Reform Bill. A draft Act of Parliament providing for Adult Suffrage, Payment of Members and their election expenses, Second Ballot, and a thorough system of Registration, with full notes and precedents. 10th thousand. 20 pp. Id.; or 9d. per doz. No. 15.-English Progress towards Social Democracy. An account of the evolution of English Society, with explanation of Socialism. 16 pp., Id., 9d. per doz. tors. No. 16.-A Plea for the Eight Hours Bill. A brief answer to objec4 pp., 6 for Id., Is. per 100. The LECTURE LIST, containing the names of sixty lecturers, who offer their services gratuitously, may be obtained on application to the Secretary. Upwards of 1000 lectures were delivered by members during the year ended in March, 1890. THE Bill submitted in this pamphlet was drafted by the Political Committee of the Fabian Society in November, 1889, with the object of embodying in precise and Parliamentary terms certain familiar demands for the democratic regulation of industry. The Committee expressed in its clauses only proposals for legislative reform which are plainly within the immediate scope of practical politics. Their aim was, first, to supply both advocates and opponents of the limitation of the Working Day with a model of an Eight Hours Bill which might serve as a test for Parliamentary candidates, and as an illustration of the method in which our existing political machinery can be applied to enforce such limitation; and, secondly, to formulate amendments most pressingly required for the extension of the benefits of the Acts already protecting and ordering Labour for the common good, and for ensuring their efficiency where their provisions have been found to fail. The Bill, accordingly, is divided into two parts. The first, which is concerned exclusively with the regulation of hours, is largely (like the second) a development and amendment of laws already in force. But while it enacts a limitation of hours in certain employments already regulated by the State, and enables such limitation to be imposed in all privileged undertakings and monopolies, it undertakes no more, with regard to other employments, than to guarantee to the workers the power to enforce a similar restriction, without the need of any further law-making, as soon as they shall themselves desire to do so. The notes which are appended to the various clauses are confined for the most part to references to existing laws and precedents, and to explanations of the principles followed in novel provisions. No attempt has been made to develop the general arguments for the restriction of hours of labour, or for interference with the arrangements of employers. Such an undertaking is outside of the scope of this pamphlet. Its intention will be fulfilled if it supplies a formulation of this policy sufficiently precise and practical to render it impossible for "business men," officials, or politicians to evade the issues raised on the ground of their vagueness or Utopianism. The general arguments on the subject may be gathered from the publications named on page 16. No uniform Act of Parliament can deal with all occupations, and this Bill, if it became the law of England, would not of itself secure an eight hours day for every worker. But if this Bill proposes as much as can forthwith be done by law, and if what it proposes can all forthwith be done, legislation founded upon it might claim an honourable place in the file of industrial enactments, and, as with all such legislation, its actual working only can teach what is the best direction for further application of its principles. The adoption, wholly or in part, by the London Liberal and Radical Union, the Metropolitan Radical Federation, the London Trades Council, and most of the London Working Men's Clubs of the general principle of this draft Bill, as well as the enormous Eight Hours Demonstration" in Hyde Park on May 4th, 1890, sufficiently indicate the progress of the movement. ENTITLED AN ACT TO AMEND THE FACTORY AND WORKSHOP ACT, 1878, AND TO PREVENT EXCESSIVE HOURS OF LABOUR. 1. This Act may be cited as the Hours of Labour Act, 1890, and shall, except as regards the sixth section, be read and construed as one with the Factory and Workshop Act, 1878, and the Acts amending the same. The whole Bill applies, like the existing Factory Acts, to Scotland and Ireland, as well as to England and Wales. The sixth clause, relating to mines, will more conveniently be incorporated in the Mines Regulation Acts, so as to be enforced by the Mine Inspectors. The definitions of terms are given in the Factory Act of 1878. 2. This Act shall come into operation on the first of January, 1891.. PART I. The Normal Day and Week. 3. In contracts for the hire of labour, or the employment of personal service in any capacity, a day shall, unless otherwise specified, be deemed to mean a period of eight working hours, and a week shall be deemed to mean a period of forty-eight working hours. This is already law in various American States, such as New York, Illinois, California, and Wisconsin. In others, such as Pennsylvania, Ohio, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, Maine, Michigan, and Nebraska, ten hours is the normal day. (See First Annual Report of Federal Commissioner of Labour, 1886.) To these may be added Florida (ten hours), Indiana and Connecticut (eight hours), (See Foreign Office Report, C—5886.) The clause would not prevent agreements to work for a longer period: hence it will, in itself, only be useful as declaring the public opinion as to the proper maximum hours of labour, and as a means of thereby bringing about a voluntary shortening of hours where they exceed this maximum. "Overtime would therefore not be universally prohibited, but the remaining clauses of the Bill make no distinction between "time" and "overtime," and where they apply, "overtime" will be forbidden, except in the emergencies provided for in clauses 4, 5, and 6. For Government Servants. 4. No person employed under the Crown in the United Kingdom in any department of the public service, other than military or naval, or by any county council, municipal corporation, vestry, local sanitary authority, school board, board of guardians of the poor, dock or harbour trustees, district board of works, district council, improvement commissioners, commissioners of sewers, of public libraries, or of baths and wash-houses, or by any other public administrative authority, shall, except in case of special unforeseen emergency, be employed for a longer period than eight hours in any one day, nor for more than forty-eight hours in any one week: provided that in cases of public emergency a Secretary of State shall have power, by order published in the London Gazette, to suspend, for such employments and for such period as may be specified in such order, the operation of this section. Any public officer ordering or requiring any person in public employment to remain at work for a period in excess of either of those herein specified, except in case of special unforeseen emergency, shall be liable to a fine not exceeding ten pounds. Any public authority, or the principal officer of any department of the public service, employing or permitting to be employed by reason of special unforeseen emergency, any person in excess of either of the periods herein specified, shall report the fact within seven days to Secretary of State, and a complete list of such cases shall be laid before both houses of Parliament once in each year. This is already law in the States of New York and California; but in the former case "overtime is permitted. (First Annual Report of Federal Commissioner of Labour, 1886; see also C-5866.) United States Statutes, c. 43, sec. 3738, enacts it for labourers employed on Government works, in navy yards, etc. (see p. 56 of C-5866). Maryland law limits the working day in the State tobacco warehouses to ten hours (p. 55 of C-5866). The Royal Commission on Labour and Capital in Canada recommended that all Government work should be subject to a maximum of nine hours per day. Eight hours is fixed by law for Government works in Victoria. (Sir C. W. Dilke's "Problems of Greater Britain," vol. ii., p. 286.) The hours are the same in the Portuguese Government tobacco factories. (Times, 3rd May, 1890.) Provision is made in the clause for "overtime" in case of "special unforeseen emergency," but every such case must be reported and published. In case moreever of " public emergency," as in the existing Factory Act, a Secretary of State will be able to suspend the operations of the whole section, but the order must be published. At present he has power to exempt from the existing Acts Government factories (see sec. 93 of 41 Vic., c. 16); and this power is frequently exercised without the knowledge of the public. Besides preventing excessive hours in any one department, the clause will also put a stop to the practice which prevails in the Post Office, Inland Revenue and Customs Departments, of taking on, as casual workers or “ glut men," or even for the performance of the regular work of the department, persons who have already done a day's work in one of the other departments. This re-engagement of exhausted workers is obviously a fraud on the public. The principle of this clause has been adopted by the London Liberal and Radical Union, the Metropolitan Radical Federation, and by all parties to the great"Eight Hours Demonstration" in London on 4th May, 1890. For Railway Servants. 5. No person employed wholly or mainly to work railway signals or points shall be employed continuously for more than eight hours, nor for more than forty-eight hours in any one week. No person employed as engine-driver, fireman, guard, or wholly or mainly in shunting, on any railway, shall be employed continuously for more than twelve hours, nor for more than forty-eight hours in any one week. The General Manager of any railway company employing or permitting to be employed any person in contravention of this |