Albuquerque morning journal. [volume] (Albuquerque, N.M.) 1903-1926, 1919-02-13
SOCIAL lists WANT
CHILD AND WOMAN
TO|LERS HELPED
Berne Conference Considering
Program Providing Rigid
Restrictions, Some of Which
British viii Oppose,
BY Beatrice Baskerville.
Copyright, 1919 by The Press Publish
70


Especial Cable Dispatch to World and
Albuquerque Journal)
Berne, Feb. 1.-THE international
labor chart which is to be used as a
basis for a code of international laws
to be enforced by a permanent COM
mittee will be discussed by the trade
union conference tomorrow, if the
present business is over in time, or by
Monday at the latest.
Owing to the fact that all the labor
members of the conference attach
more importance to it than to any
other part of the League of Nations
scheme, 1 have been able to procure
an advance copy of the draft, which
will be very much discussed, espe-
cially by British labor.
Whatever alterations may be made
in it, <tfle final charter will be en-
forced by a permanent committee,
consisting of one-half of labor dele
gates, elected by all the nations sub
sCribing to the charter and e-half
of League of Nations delegates. Its
most serious clauses are described in
the preamble as the minimum require
ments, if the wars devastation is to
be made good.
Child Labor Prohibited.
The first clause forbids the employ
ment of children under fifteen in alb
industries Clause g, which will
be fought hard by British labor, re-
quires a maximum siX-hour day for
youths of both sexes, between fifteen
and eighteen years of age, with one
and a half hours intermission for
food after four hours work. The
British and most of the French dele
gates say this pause is too long by
at least an hour, and will fight it. The
same clause demands two hours
of daily teaching for young workers
of both sexes in industrial or con-
tinuation classes, with leave to at
tend them from their employers.
1t prohibits the employment of
youths between s o'clock at night and
o'clock in the morning, also on Sun
days and holidays, and in all spe-
cially unhealthy trades. 1t prohibits
also the employment of youths in
mines below ground. The british
delegates will fight this too, because
they are agitating in England for the
employment only of boys between
fourteen and eighteen in the mines,
because the older men are unable to
work in such cramped spaces, and
also because the hlSn wages attract
numbers of men to the mines from
other industries, causing .unemploy-
ment among the real miners.
Half Holiday for Women.
The labor delegation told the World
and Journal correspondent that the
British will never agree to clause 2 as
it now stands. The third clause pro-
hibits more than four hours work for
women on Saturdays providing for a
half-holiday on some other day of the
week if this is not feasible. 1t pro-
hihits the employment of women for
night work, for especially unhealthy
trades, and for home work after reg
uiar day work; it also prohibits fe-
male labor for ten weeks altogether
before and after childbirth, and
makes maternity insurance obligatory
in all countries 1t also provides that
women get the same pay as men for
the same work,
Margaret Bonfield of Great Britain
has had large share in drawing this
clause and will take part in the dis
cussion when the charter comes be-
fore the conference.