The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1844-03-19 00:00:00

HOUSE OF COMMONS.-FRIDAY.

The business of the house was the committee on the
Factories' Bill. On the Bth clause of it,
Lord ASHLEY addressed the committee. He dis-
claimed any hostility to the mill-owners ; he had not found
that avarice and cruelty were confined to any one set of
men ; all classes were more or less guilty of it ; witness
the hardships of the dressmakers, who are oppressed by
no manufacturer or landlord, but who suffer in order to
meet the suddenly varying caprices of fashion—nay, the
demands of the gentler sex. He would assert the right
of the state to interpose for the protection of the labourer.
He mentioned the general regulations on this subject
which are established in several foreign countries; and
showed the great increase which had taken place in the
numbers of the persons employed in England upon the
five principal branches of manufacture. In 1818 those
branches occupied 57,000 persons; in 1839 their numbers
were 419,000. He explained the nature and severity of
the labour required by machinery ; calculating the length
of ground which in some sorts of work each spinner goes
over per day of 12 hours in following the machines called
mules—a length amounting often to more than 25, some-
times even to more than 35 miles in the clay. He pointed
out the ill effects of this excessive labour upon the health
and eyesight of the operatives, and fortified his deductions
by the opinions of several eminent physicians. The mis-
chief showed itself in the early superannuation of the peo-
ple, of whom not more than about 6 per cent. remained
fit for full work after 45 years of age. Their habits were
such, that a provision for later life was hardly ever made
by them. The exhaustion from early labour was so
great, that they could work at no other occupation when
cast off from the factories ; and a large proportion
of them were thus reduced, in the middle of life, to sub-
sist wholly upon the earnings of their children. He
showed, from the statistics of other coura ries, as well as
of our own, the disadvantageous effect of manufacturing,
as compared with agricultural, labour upon the health of
the labourers. He dwelt particularly on the extensive
prevalence, in many factories, of the practice of employ-
ing women for continuous lengths of time so great, as to
preclude, especially in the case of mothers, the possibility
of their attending to their natural duties, and thus their
children were drugged with laudanum until it became al-
most a necessary of existence. He adverted still more
earnestly to the fearful effects produced upon morals
through the promiscuous way in which males and females
are intermingled in their working hours ; and through the
insubordination produced by the consciousness of the
women and children that their earnings are the chief de-
pendence of thtir husbands and fathers. These evils bbd
at length produced an impression upon the minds of the
mill-owners themselves, who were now found in great
numbers desirous to co-operate towards such a limita-
tion of labour with regard to time and sex as should
apply a remedy to the mischief, and restore the women
to their conjugal and maternal duties. He asked, on
behalf of the poor, a time to live and a time to die—a
time for the duties of life, and a time for its comforts ;
and he concluded by moving that the night, instead of
being computed from eight o'clock in the evening, should
be computed from six o'clock.
Sir J. GRAHAM felt much pain in opposing the motion
of the noble lord. The real point now raised was whether
the working day for women and young persons should
consist of 12 hours or of 10; and that was a question ra-
ther of degree than of principle. He questioned Lord
Ashley's details of the spinner's mileage, which appeared
to him to be impossible. Those details had been cal-
culated at a certain reasonable rate of velocity in the ma-
chinery ; but. if the hours should be shortened, the velocity
was sure to be so accelerated as to compensate the de-
ficiency. He would not examine into the question of
comparative salubrity as between agricultural and manu-
factoring industry • for both employments were essential
to the prosperity of this great country. He denied that
economy was unknown among the operatives, and adduced
some striking examples of it which had come to his know-
ledge on that very day. The sympathies of all men must
be with the noble lord's object; but he believed that the
manufacturing labourers themselves would not be gainers
by the concession of this particular proposal ; and the
masters had acquiesced in the other limitations which the
present bill contained, on the express understanding that
the government would support that main clause which
allows young persons and women to be employed for
twelve hours. It was now proposed to abridge by one-
sixth the whole period allowed for the replacement of
capital and the production of profit. But what would be
the consequence of that abridgment? Why, that a pro-
portionate abridgment would immediately be made in the
wages of the workpeople; and the workpeople themselves
were all aware of that inevitable consequence.
After several members bad spoken,
Lord SANDON felt that this measure was experimental,
but thought there was good ground to expect its success.
It had succeeded on a large scale in factories where it had
been voluntarily adopted.
Mr. BRIGHT saw no need for anew factory bill. There
was hardly a complaint made by Lord Ashley against the
manufacturing towns of the north which might not be
equally well alleged against London or Birmingham. He
then went into details, for the purpose of contradicting
what Lord Ashley had said of the unhealthiness and other
miseries of the manufacturing districts. The labour of the
London milliners and dressmakers, during the season,
was much worse than the severest toil in any of the fac-
tories. In the factory districts, though the population
had generally multiplied, there had been a more than
proportionate increase of schools and places of worship.
He travelled into a variety of statistics, to show the
high wages and general prosperity and comfort of the
manufacturing population : and contrasted the rarity of
parochial relief among them with its frequency in the
county which Lord Ashley represents. Lord Ashley
looked through a telescope at the manufacturing districts,
and brought their evils magnified and approximated to
his sight ; but when he had to view the suffering state of
his own neighbours in Dorsetshire he reversed the glass,
and made the object smaller, and more distant than the
reality. He admitted that the hours of work were longer
than they ought to be ; but the evils of the people arose,
not from overwork, but mainly from excessive taxation
and unjust monopoly.
LORD ASHLEY rebutted, with a good deal of agitation,
some personalities against himself which Mr. Bright had
introduced into his speech.
This brought on some altercation, in the course of
which the house marked its disapproval of Mr. Bright's
tone and language. Mr. Bright at last disclaimed any
intention to offend Lord Ashley, and the apology was
accepted.
The house adjourned.