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Spectator. 1835/02/21. The Country. London. Get it:
.An election ball in honour of the return of Sir John Beckett as MP was given on Wednesday week at the Assembly Rooms in connection with the White Cloth Halls and the suite of rooms at the Music Hall, including the concert rooms and the exhibition galleries of the Royal Northern Society of Paintings. The number of tickets sold was nearly 3,000, and amongst the purchasers were most of the leading Tory families of the county, particularly of the town and neighbourhood of Leeds. The Cloth Hall was formed into a magnificent promenade, 70 yards in length, brilliantly illuminated, in which refreshments were provided in abundance. This splendid promenade conducted to another ball-room 60 yards in length.
The mill-owners and their operatives in the woollen district are becoming alive to the great importance of taking immediate measures to obtain such an amendment of the Factory Act as will enable them to continue the working of their mills. After the 1st of March next, it will be unlawful to work any child under 12 years of age more than eight hours per day, in any woollen, worsted, flax, or cotton mill. In many places it is already found difficult to obtain a sufficient number of children for the mills, owing to the restriction in the Act, preventing children under 11 years from working more than eight hours. The effect of this has everywhere been to prevent the employment of such children altogether; as it is found impossible to work with relays of children, or to provide for their education in the way prescribed by the Act. On the 1st of next month, that very numerous class of children between 11 and 12 years of age, amounting to many thousands, will have to be dismissed from their employment. The consequence will be, that the children will be turned idle upon the streets to learn vagabond habits; that the families to whom they belong will lose a considerable part of their weekly income; that both parents and children will be pinched for food and clothing; and that the mill-owners must stop their mills, as in most places it will be impossible to obtain a sufficient number of children above 12 years of age. It is now the almost universal opinion both of the mill-owners and the operatives in the woollen district, that an Eleven Hours Bill – a bill restricting the labour to 11 hours a day, and not allowing children under 10 years to work those hours – would be most conducive to the interests and happiness of all parties, including the children themselves.
The full Mercury article:
The mill-owners and their operatives in the woollen district are becoming alive to the great importance of taking immediate measures, to obtain such an amendment of the Factory Act as will enable them to continue the working of their mills. After the first of March next, it will be unlawful to work any child under twelve years of age more than eight hours per day in any woollen, worsted, flax, or cotton mill. In many places it is already found difficult to obtain a sufficient number of children for the mills, owing to the restriction in the Act, preventing children under eleven years from working more than eight hours. The effect of this has every where been to prevent the employment of such children altogether, as it is found impossible to work with relays of children, or to provide for their education in the way prescribed by the Act. On the first of next month, that very numerous class of children between eleven and twelve years of age, amounting to many thousands, will have to be dismissed from their employment, if the Act is put into effect. consequence will be, that the children will be turned idle upon the streets to learn vagabond habits, that the families to whom they belong will lose a considerable part of their weekly income, that both parents and children will be pinched for food and clothing, and that the mill-owners must stop their mills, as in most places it will be quite impossible to obtain a sufficient number of children above twelve years of age.
We direct the attention of our readers to the resolutions passed at a numerous meeting of the mill owners of Pudsey, on Wednesday last, published in our advertising columns. These resolutions express the unanimous sense of the mill-owners in that whole district, and they point out very clearly the evils of the restrictions above mentioned. Nor is the alarm felt by the masters alone; the workmen and their families are equally alive to the mischief which is coming upon them, and are aware that if the Act is not amended, they will be deprived of the earnings of all their children under twelve years of age, and will have to support them in idleness. On Saturday last the operatives of Pudsey met, and passed resolutions entirely concurring with those of the masters, except that, instead of petitioning that children of nine years of age may be allowed to work eleven hours in the day, they ask that children of eight years may be allowed to work those hours. Their resolutions to this effect will be found in another column. We think the request of the masters is perfectly reasonable and consistent with humanity; but we should not like to see children below nine years employed for eleven hours per day in the mills. The operatives of Bramley, Farsley, and Calverley, met on Wednesday night, and came to a similar conclusion with their fellow-operatives of Pudsey. It is the intention of these parties to petition for an amendment of the Act, on the principles we have mentioned. The parents of the children are fully concurring with the work-people in this object. The mill-owners have already prepared their petition, and it will be sent up so as to be presented at the opening of Parliament.
It is evident that the emergency is such as to call upon all persons interested in mills, whether as masters or workmen, to bestir themselves immediately in order to obtain an alteration in the Act. That alteration cannot be procured by the first of March; but we hope, if the, mill-owners and their workmen generally should petition, the Factory Inspectors would think it consistent with their duty to abstain from rigorously enforcing the Act till a Bill can be passed for its amendment. Of this, however, we cannot be certain; and it is manifest that the Inspectors will not take upon themselves such a responsibility unless the movement among the mill-owners and operatives is very general, as nothing less than a general declaration of the impossibility of complying with the Act would justify them in suspending its operation. We have not the slightest hesitation in saying that an alteration of the Act is necessary, for the preservation of our trade, and for the interests of all classes connected with it.
It is now the almost universal opinion both of the mill-owners and the operatives in the woollen district, that an Eleven Hours Bill, i. e. a bill restricting the labour to eleven hours a day, and not allowing children under ten years to work those hours, would be most conducive to the interests and happiness of all parties, including the children themselves. This opinion was found to be the average of the opinions expressed by a great number of the operatives in the cotton mills of Manchester, at a meeting with Mr. RICKARDS, the Factory Inspector, last Saturday. The same conclusion was come to at a meeting of the overlookers in the worsted mills of Bradford, held on Wednesday evening-all the overlookers being favourable to eleven hours, except those of Mr. Jous WOOD, who preferred ten hours, and the age at which children were to be admissible being ten years. We must say, however, that the masters in the worsted and flax mills are favourable to eleven hours and a half, and in the cotton mills to twelve hours. Many of the operatives in this town have sent memorials to government in favour of an Eleven Hours Bill.
We understand that a circular was lately sent by Mr. BAKER, the Factory Superintendent, to the Medical men who grant certificates to Factory Children in the West Riding, inquiring if in their opinion children ten years of age might be allowed to work twelve hours a day without injury to their health. Out of 59 answers received, 40 replied in the affirmative; 14 in the negative; and 5 were dubious. We may therefore venture to assume that there could at least be no objection to children of that age working eleven hours a day, i. e. one hour less.
It is worthy of being known that the number of children in this town alone, who might be employed in the mills if children of ten years were admissible, but who would, be prevented from working if children were not admissible under twelve, is 960. Of course several hundred poor families. would be prevented from obtaining the earnings they might receive, if the present Act should be put in force on the 1st of March. And this is no advantage to the children themselves, but the reverse: it leaves them to idle habits, and renders it impossible for workmen to pay for the education even of those who are under ten years of age.
MR. RICKARDS, the active and humane Inspector, who is now making a circuit to ascertain the opinions of the work- people and the masters on the Factory Act, will be in Leeds next Wednesday; on Monday next he will be in Halifax; on Tuesday in Bradford; and after remaining four or five days in Leeds, he will go to Wakefield and Huddersfield. This week he has been in Bolton, Bury, Rochdale, and other Lancashire towns. We believe Mr. RICKARDS is exceedingly desirous to meet with deputations both from the masters and the workmen, especially the latter, that he may be the better prepared to recommend such an amendment of the Factory Act as may meet their interests and wishes.
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At Leeds, an election ball in honour of the return of Sir J. Beckett, was given on Wednesday week, at the Leeds Assembly Rooms, in connexion with the White Cloth Halls and the suite of rooms at the Music Hall, including the concert-rooms and the exhibition galleries of the Royal Northern Society of Paintings. The number of tickets sold was nearly 3000; and amongst the purchasers were most of the leading Tory families of the county, particularly of the town and neighbourhood of Leeds. The Cloth Hall was formed into a magnificent promenade, seventy yards in length, brilliantly illuminated, in which refreshments were provided in abundance. This splendid promenade conducted to another ball-room sixty yards in length.
The mill-owners and their operatives in the woollen district are becoming alive to the great importance of taking immediate measures to obtain such an amendment of the Factory Act as will enable them to continue the working of their mills. After the 1st of March next, it will be unlawful to work any child under twelve years of age more than eight hours per day, in any woollen, worsted, flax, or cotton mill. In many places it is already found difficult to obtain a sufficient number of children for the mills, owing to the restriction in the Act, preventing children under eleven years from working more than eight hours. The effect of this has everywhere been to prevent the employment of such children altogether; as it is found impossible to work with relays of children, or to provide for their education in the way prescribed by the Act. On the 1st of next month, that very numerous class of children between eleven and twelve years of age, amounting to many thousands, will have to be dismissed from their employment, if the Act is put into effect. The consequence will be, that the children will be turned idle upon the streets to learn vagabond habits; that the families to whom they belong will lose a considerable part of their weekly income; that both parents and children will be pinched for food and clothing; and that the mill-owners must stop their mills, as in most places it will be impossible to obtain a sufficient number of children above twelve years of age. It is now the almost universal opinion both of the mill-owners and the operatives in the woollen district, that an Eleven Hours Bill, i. e. a bill restricting the labour to eleven hours a day, and not allowing children under ten years to work those hours, would be most conducive to the interests and happiness of all parties, including the children themselves.—Leeds Mercury.
460 words.
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