The Theory and Policy of Labour Protection Part 2

Hence results the following cla.s.sification of industrial wage-labour, according to the kind of protection required:--

I. Labourers requiring protection against _exterior_ dangers:

_a._ According to the kinds of occupation:

1. Having reference to the different branches of industry:

Wage-labour in mining, manufacture, trade, traffic and transport, and in service of all kinds.

2. Having reference to the special dangers of employment within any particular branch of industry: dangerous--non-dangerous work.

_b._ According to type of business:

1. Having reference to the position or personality of the employer:

Wage-labour under private employers--wage-labour under government.

2. Having reference to the choice of the labourers by the employer, and the nature of their mutual relations.

Factory-labour,

Quasi-factory labour (especially labour in workshops of a similar nature to factories), other kinds of workshop labour,

Household industries (home-labour),

Family labour.

II. Labourers requiring protection against _personal_ dangers:

_a._ Having reference to the common need of protection as men and citizens.

1. Adult--juvenile workers;

2. Male--female workers;

3. Married--unmarried female workers;

4. Apprentices--qualified wage-workers;

5. Wage-workers subject to school duties--exempt from school duties,

_b._ Having reference to the need of protection arising out of differences in the position occupied by the wage workers in the business:

Skilled labourers (such as professional wage-workers, business managers, overseers and foremen; or technical wage-workers, mechanics, chemists, draughtsmen, modellers); unskilled labourers.

I. PROTECTION AGAINST EXTERIOR DANGERS.

A glance at existing legislation on Labour Protection, or even only at the various paragraphs of the _von Berlepsch_ Industrial Code Amendment Bill, clearly shows the definite significance of all these foregoing cla.s.ses in the codification of protective right. Each one of these cla.s.ses is treated both generally and specifically in the Labour Acts.

Mining industries, industrial (manufacturing) work, and wage service in trade, traffic, and transport, do not all receive an equal measure of Labour Protection.

Differences in the danger of the occupation play a great part in the labour-protective legislation of every country.

Labour Protection has therefore hitherto been, and will probably for some time continue to be in effect, protection of factory and quasi-factory labour (I.B. 2, _supra_), but in all probability it will gradually include protection of household industry also. Even the English Factory and Workshop Acts do not, however, extend protection to wage-labour in family industry.

Business managers have hitherto received no protection, or a much smaller measure than that extended to common wage-labourers.

Furthermore, Labour Protection has. .h.i.therto been administered through different channels, according as it is applied to professions of a public nature, in which discipline is necessary, especially the military profession, or to professions of a non-public nature.

Lastly, with regard to individual differences of need for labour protection, adult labour has. .h.i.therto received only a restricted measure of protection, whereas the labour of women and children has long been fairly adequately dealt with; the prohibition of employment of married women in factory-labour still remains an unsolved problem in the domain of Labour Protection question, but it is a measure that has already received powerful support.

It must of course be understood that Labour Protection is still in process of development. But according to all present appearances, there is no prospect, at any rate for some time to come, of its general extension to all cla.s.ses of industrial wage-labour, for instance that the prohibition of night work will be extended to all adult male labourers, or that Sunday work will be absolutely prohibited in carrying industries and in public houses. We must even do justice to the Auer Motion in the Reichstag, by acknowledging that it does not go the length of demanding the universal application of such protection.

In the existing positive laws, and in the further demands for protection put forward at the present day, mining industries hold the first place, then all kinds of work dangerous to life and health, household industry, the labour of women and young persons, and the labour of married women.

The reader will easily understand the reasons for this; he only requires to establish clearly in his own mind, for each of these cla.s.ses of industrial wage-labour, the grounds on which the claim to such objective and subjective protection is based, and wherein they differ from the cases where free self-help and mutual help suffice, or even the ordinary protection afforded by the State. However, this special inquiry is not necessary here; the explanation desired will be found in the study of the several applications and modes of operation of Labour Protection dealt with in the following pages.

But on the other hand it is important that we should now endeavour to form a clear idea of those larger divisions of industrial wage-labour with which a protective code has to deal, in order that we may be sure of our ground in proceeding with our investigations.

_Factory-Labour._

No small difficulty arises from the question: "What is factory-labour?"

And yet it is precisely this kind of wage-labour which has received the most comprehensive measure of protection, and become the standard by which protection is meted out to all similar kinds of employment.

The labour-protective laws of various governments have met the difficulty in various ways; but nowhere is a positive legal definition given of the Factory.

In the case of Germany, especially, it is not easy to form a clear idea of the meaning attached to factory labour by the hitherto existing protective laws, and by the _von Berlepsch_ Industrial Bill.

We may arrive at a clearer conception of what a factory really is in the protective sense of the word, by examining first the essential characteristics of such kinds of employment as are placed by the protective laws on the _same_ (or nearly the same) footing as factory labour, and then observing the peculiarities of such kinds of employments as are legally _excluded_ from factory-labour protection.

The same characteristics in all those points in which it is affected by protection, will be found in the Factory, but the peculiarities of the other contrasted cla.s.s will be absent from the Factory.

In the Imperial Industrial Code, especially in the _von Berlepsch_ Bill, the following four categories of employment are placed on the same footing as the Factory; in the case of the first three the inclusion is obligatory, in the case of the last it is optional and depends on the pleasure of the Bundesrath (local authority):

1. Mines, salt-pits (salines), preparatory work above ground, and underground work, in mines and quarries (other than those referred to in the Factory Regulations).

2. Smelting-houses, carpenter's yards, and other building-yards, wharves, and such brick-kilns, mines, and quarries as are worked above ground and are not merely temporary and on a small scale.

3. Those work-shops in which power machinery is employed (straw, wind, water, gas, electricity, etc.) not merely temporarily.

4. "Other" workshops to which factory protection (except as regards working rules) can be extended under the Imperial decree, at the discretion of the Bundesrath.[5]

A common designation is needed which will include all these four categories.