APPRENTICESHIP OF TO-DAY
A true apprenticeship system, as already explained, must satisfy three conditions: It must guarantee the adequate supervision of the youth of the country as regards physical and moral development until the age of eighteen at least is reached; it must supply means of effective training, both general and specialized; and, finally, it must provide to those about to cross the threshold of manhood an opening in some form of occupation for which definite preparation has been given. The efficiency of the industrial organization of to-day must be judged by the extent to which these three conditions are satisfied.
To what extent does the apprenticeship of to-day satisfy the conditions of a true apprenticeship system? To answer this question we must look far beyond the narrow limits of indentured apprenticeship as it still exists. It touches only a fringe, and a vanishing fringe, of the problem. Life for the youth has grown more complex since the passing of the old organization of the gilds; its success or failure is the outcome of the interplay of numerous forces. Four factors contribute, in a more or less degree, to the result. There is the contribution ofthe State—the last chapter was concerned with the description of the machinery which has slowly been set up during the age of reconstruction—we have yet to test its influence in the actual working; there is the contribution of philanthropic enterprise, as represented in the religious bodies, the clubs, the apprenticeship associations, and skilled employment committees; there is the contribution of the home, with its discipline and training; and, finally, there is the contribution of the workshop, using this term to include all forms of occupation, with the methods of entry and the organization for securing a supply of labour. Only when we have taken into account the effects of these four factors can we pass judgment on the apprenticeship of to-day.
I.
The Contribution of the State.
In estimating the contribution of the State towards apprenticeship of to-day, it will be convenient, as in the last chapter, to trace the effect of this influence in two sections, the one devoted to a survey of the results of State regulation, and the other to an examination of the achievements of State enterprise.
§ 1. STATE REGULATION.
In its scheme of regulation the State has aimed, broadly speaking, at securing three results. It has endeavoured to prevent boys from being overworked or wrongly worked; it has sought to guard them from being engagedin demoralizing forms of employment; and it has striven to secure satisfactory conditions within the walls of the workshop.
The third task presents the fewest difficulties. Medical science is sufficiently advanced to prescribe the conditions as to ventilation, heating, sanitation, and cubic contents essential to the health of the boys. The sad catalogue of accidents is sufficiently long to show where danger, through inadequately guarded machinery, is probable. To enforce the necessary regulations is comparatively easy. There must be a suitable number of inspectors, and these inspectors must be specially trained for their work. Neither condition is at present fulfilled. The staff of inspectors is much too small, and the inspectors themselves frequently lack the requisite technical qualifications.
In the work of guarding boys from being engaged in occupations demoralizing to character, the State has only recently taken the first steps. The Employment of Children Act prohibits street trading under certain conditions. As will appear later in this chapter, there are a large number of occupations where regulation is much required. Indeed, it is a comparatively new idea that the nature of the employment of the boy may have a profound influence on the well-being of the man.
In the department of regulation the most elaborate machinery has grown up around the attempts of the State to prevent boys from being overworked or wrongly worked. The difficulties in the way of success have beentwo. There has been the difficulty in getting the necessary law passed. In this respect it is enough to mention that the “half-time” system, in spite of practically universal condemnation, is still permitted, to show the almost insurmountable obstacles presented by vested interests. There is next the difficulty of enforcing the law. It is often urged that it is idle to place on the statute-book laws which can easily be evaded. Too much weight must not, however, be given to this argument. There is a moral effect in the passing of every law. The fact that the State has condemned certain modes of action is an important factor in the formation of public opinion. Many people realize for the first time that the evils which are the result of conduct hitherto regarded as harmless, because not regarded at all, are sufficiently serious to call for State interference. The law may not have its full effect; it will without doubt have some effect.
The question of enforcement is, however, of vital importance, and it is well to consider the limits of the power of enforcement.
The best method of restricting the hours of employment is to see that the boy is somewhere else during part of the working day. The half-time system, which insured that the boy should spend half his time in school, was established, not primarily with a view to his education, but to prevent him from being overworked. It has, moreover, from its point of view, been completely successful, and has in practice been enforced without difficulty. The various laws relating to compulsory attendance at schoolhave exercised an influence more potent in the work of limiting the hours of employment than all the other elaborate regulations on the subject. If we see to it that a boy is in school, he cannot at the same time be found in the factory. The machinery for enforcing attendance now runs without difficulty, and its action is uniform and comprehensive.
The next method of restricting employment is the method of prohibition. Here, again, enforcement presents no serious difficulty. If we forbid children under a certain age to work for wages or to take part in certain forms of occupation, it is enough to find them so engaged at any one moment to secure a conviction.
The third method, which seeks to prevent boys from being overworked by setting a limit on the number of hours during which they may be employed, is almost impossible to carry out. The Shop Hours Act is frequently infringed, and only the most rigid system of inspection can get evidence of cases of infringement. Yet even here detection is comparatively easy. A watch can be kept on the number of hours during which a shop is open, and if this exceed the legal limit we have a fair presumption that the shop assistants are over-employed. But in the case of children we cannot draw this conclusion. We are supposing their hours are more limited than in the case of the adults, and the mere fact that the shop is open during a longer period affords no proof that the child is there all the day on all days of the week. To enforce regulations of this kind we must set a watch on theindividual child, and on a large scale this is impracticable.
In judging of the results of State regulation, as described in the preceding chapter, we may assume that the regulations are enforced—or at any rate are enforceable—where employment is prohibited, or where attendance at school is required, but that regulations which entail the counting of hours have little effect in preventing overwork except by the indirect method of forming public opinion. Further, when we are seeking a path of reform, we must take the road of prohibition or alternative attendance at school.
Leaving general considerations, and coming to details, it may be said that, so far as children under the age of fourteen are concerned, the system of State regulation, though a little cumbersome, covers a considerable part of the field, provided always that local education authorities make full use of the powers conferred by the Education Acts, the School Attendance Acts, the Children Act, and the Employment of Children Act, and provided also that the Board of Education and the Home Office render full and cordial support. Unfortunately, these provisos are very far from being fulfilled. More than 58 per cent. of the population, for example, live in districts where the attendance by-laws allow of conditional exemption at the age of twelve.
It is true that in nearly half the cases a fairly high standard of attainment is required from the children, but with the remainder no higher standard is required thanthat reached by the normal child at the age of twelve.[91]Or, again, in connection with the Employment of Children Act, out of seventy-four county boroughs, fifty have made by-laws in reference to street trading, but large towns, like Leeds, Nottingham, or Salford, have made none. Out of 191 smaller boroughs and urban districts, only forty-one have made by-laws; and out of the sixty-two administrative counties, other than London and Middlesex, only one.[92]It may fairly be assumed that, where no by-laws relating to street trading exist, little is done to enforce the other provisions of the Act.
As regards young persons, if we exclude the Acts relating to mines, which affect a comparatively small number of lads, the Shop Hours Act, with its mild provisions of seats for assistants and a maximum week of seventy-four hours, the only Act which can be said to exert a large measure of supervision is the Factory and Workshop Act. Assuming that the system of regulation there found is adequate, and adequately enforced—both assumptions far from being fulfilled in practice—there remain the young persons who do not come within its provisions. The number of these is very large. In the next chapter figures are given relating to the occupations of London children on leaving school and between the ages of fifteen and twenty. A study of these tables will show that not more than at most a third of the youngpersons are brought within the scope of the Factory and Workshop Act. A large proportion of the lads engaged in the building trades, and practically the whole of those employed in shops, in transport, in commerce, and in general labour, are excluded. In their case there is no State supervision to regulate the conditions of their work.
Coming to concrete examples, the van-boy may in all kinds of weather spend a dozen hours a day lolling on the tail of a cart, idle for much of his time, and for the remainder holding the horses outside a public-house, or lifting weights too heavy for his strength. The errand-boy, none too well clad or shod, may, delivering parcels and messages, trudge through the cold and rain over long leagues of streets during long stretches of the week. The office-boy may be cooped up in a dark and ill-ventilated office during most of the hours of daylight. The shop-boy may stand ten, twelve, or on Saturdays fifteen hours of the twenty-four in the street or in the shop, with one eye on the goods and the other on a penny novelette. And there is no public authority to say whether the conditions of his employment are satisfactory, no power to have him medically inspected, no possible guarantee to insure that when he passes the threshold of early manhood the vigour and the brightness of youth shall not have given way to the feeble health and the torpor of old age. Unquestionably, we owe much to sentiment for the evils it has denounced and remedied, but we owe also to the régime of sentiment the fact that some two-thirds ofthe young persons in the country are engaged in occupations carried on without regulation and unvisited by any inspector of the State.
§ 2. STATE ENTERPRISE.
The most signal example of State enterprise in the realm of boy labour is to be found in that huge organization of schools, elementary and continuation, which now cover the country, and whose efficiency is rapidly increasing. The organization has already been described; it remains to summarize briefly its principal effects. First, the boys attend school with astonishing regularity. An average percentage of attendances during the year of ninety-five, and even more, is become common. Truancy is rare, and growing rarer. The truant schools are being gradually emptied, and several have been closed. This result is no doubt in part due to the increased fine for non-attendance, and the pressure thus placed on the parent. But excellent attendance implies much more than the elimination of the truant; it means that, after making allowance for absences due to illness and other sufficient causes, the boy attends school with perfect regularity and punctuality at all times when the schools are opened. Now, this ideal is in the case of the vast majority of boys attained. The result must be attributed to the influence of the teachers over the boy. Prosecution of the parent may cure gross irregularity, but perfect attendance can only be secured by enlisting the co-operation of the boy. The first effect of the school, then, is seen in the almost unqualified regularityand punctuality of the attendance. If we reflect on the home conditions of many of the boys, we shall be compelled to pay a high tribute of praise to the work of the teacher. The second achievement lies in the admirable order maintained within the walls of the school. Ready obedience is the rule, and not the exception. This is in general not the result of a system of harsh discipline—corporal punishment is decreasing at once in severity and in frequency—it is due to the personal influence of the teacher. In the third place, a spirit of industry and active attention pervades the work of the school. In discussing with the authorities of secondary schools the career of the children who have won scholarships from the elementary schools, I have more than once been told that the chief characteristic of these scholars lies in their patient and strenuous diligence. In this respect they serve as an admirable example to the fee-paying pupils. It is true that the scholars are picked children, but ability and diligence are, as experience shows, by no means inseparable companions. Here, again, we see the effect of the school. Finally, the schools are institutions which make for character in the best sense of the word. The moral training is gradually freeing itself from the “do and don’t” of the home, and is beginning to reach the higher level of morality where the command is “to be this, not that.” A standard of school honour is being sought for, and sometimes attained. To take a single example. In what is perhaps the poorest school in all London, set in the most squalid and vice-haunted region, it has been madea matter of honour with the boys who are receiving school dinners to come to the headmaster as soon as the home circumstances temporarily improve and say: “I don’t want a dinner this morning, because father has got a day’s work.”
Habits of regularity, obedience, and industry, and the cultivation of a sense of honour—these are the chief results of State supervision carried out by means of the schools. Two questions require an answer: Do these qualities, found within the precincts of the school, overflow and affect the conduct of the boys outside the school? Do they last when school-days are over, and the boys gone out to work? With regard to the first, there is good reason to believe that they do overflow. The school training does influence the conduct of the boys outside. No one who has watched a zealous headmaster replace an ancient and inefficient teacher of the old type can fail to have observed a striking change in the behaviour of the boys as seen in the street and in the home. With regard to the second question, we must reply that undoubtedly in many cases the qualities gradually disappear. When we come, as we shall do shortly, to the survey of the conditions of boy labour, we shall not be surprised at this unfortunate truth. It would be difficult to imagine any form of training that would be permanent when all discipline is relaxed or entirely discontinued at the most critical period of the development of the boy.
The elementary school is now made responsible for the supervision of the health of the children. Medical inspectionof all children is now compulsory, while medical treatment is made legal. The education authority may also draw on the rates to provide meals for necessitous children. It is too soon to estimate the effect of these new powers, but if they are used with wise generosity they should exercise a profound influence on the health of the rising generation.
But however beneficent may be the influence of the elementary school, it comes to an end abruptly at the age of fourteen, and often a year or two earlier. Up to the age of leaving school, the boy is carefully guarded by the State, and then, with no transitional stage, he becomes a man, and, so far as the State is concerned, all control is withdrawn. Two or three per cent., with the help of scholarships, may pass annually to the secondary school, where State supervision is continued. Not more than 30 per cent. of those who leave the elementary school attend an evening school,[93]and even if they do there is no medical inspection in such places, and little effective discipline is possible for boys attending evening school on two or three nights a week. The remaining two-thirds disappear from the sight of the State, which henceforth renounces all responsibility for their supervision.
We have next to regard the schools as training-grounds for the workmen of the future. We ought not to look to the elementary schools to provide any definite preparation for a trade. Unfortunately, through no fault oftheir own, and because of the industrial development of the day, the schools are turning out in thousands lads completely equipped for a certain class of occupation. We have already seen that the most signal triumph of the schools is to be found in the habits of regularity, intelligence, and obedience, which they impress on the boys. Now, these qualities are essential to success in all walks of life; but for one form of employment alone are they all that is required. This form of employment includes those occupations in which boys and boys only are engaged, and where the boys are discharged as soon as they become men. The messenger-boy, the shop-boy, the van-boy, and even the boy who attends to some machine which monotonously performs a single operation—the boy who comes into one of these classes need take with him nothing but the three recommendations of regularity, obedience, and intelligence. We shall trace later the disastrous effects of these forms of employment. It is not without significance that the rapid increase in the number of boys so engaged has synchronized with the rapid improvement in the system of elementary education. It is something of a tragedy that the most signal triumph of the schools should be, perhaps, the cause of their most signal failure.
Definite training must be looked for in the continuation school. It is unnecessary to add much to what has been said in the last chapter; the State offers opportunity, but with its existing powers can do little more. Speaking generally, for the child of comparatively well-to-doparents, for the clever child, for the child of unusual energy and physical vigour, these opportunities can be enjoyed; but for the remainder—and that the great majority—they are useless, because beyond the reach of ordinary endeavour.
Of State enterprise in the provision of an opening it is too early to speak; the juvenile branch of the Labour Exchange is only creeping into existence. In the next chapter an attempt will be made to explain how best can be realized the possibilities which lie latent in these institutions.
§ 3. SUMMARY.
We are now in a position to summarize the achievements and the defects of the contribution of the State towards the creation of a true apprenticeship system. Its machinery of regulation has removed the worst abuses of child labour, and in certain departments of industry protects, with some degree of success, the health of the young persons engaged. Its enterprise in the field of education is providing supervision over the health and conduct of the boy till he reaches the age of fourteen, while for the young person it offers opportunities of longer supervision and technical training.
If much has been done, much more remains undone. Regulation still leaves rampant many of the evils of child labour. Some two-thirds of the boys as they leave school enter occupations where regulation hardly exists. State enterprise for all practical purposes exerts nosupervision over lads between the ages of fourteen and eighteen—the most important epoch of their lives. Technical training, and even the continuance of general education, are possible only for a favoured few, and for the present there is no State provision of an opening.
These are grave defects, and apprenticeship of to-day stands condemned unless it can be shown that one or other of the remaining factors supply what the State has failed to give.
II.
The Contribution of Philanthropy.
The second of the general forces, as distinguished from the individual and special influences of the home and the workshop, which may make some contribution towards the apprenticeship of to-day must be sought among the varied religious and philanthropic associations. While we could not expect from these bodies any assistance in the work of technical training, we might hope to find in their midst conditions which make for the better supervision and control of the lads who have left school.
Beginning with the more distinctly religious associations, we find among them practical unanimity of opinion. One and all confess sadly that they are unable to keep in touch with the boys after they have gone out to work. For the tens of thousands of schoolboys who attend Sunday-school there are only hundreds of lads on the roll of Bible-classes. The sudden change from the statusof schoolboy to the status of wage-earner, which for the majority severed all connection with the education authority, has even more decisively brought to an end the supervision of church and chapel.
The miscellaneous associations represented by clubs, lads’ brigades, boy scouts, and the like, have all been called into existence for the express purpose of exerting some measure of control over that transition period of life which separates the boy from the man. How many lads between the ages of fourteen and eighteen come within the sphere of influence it is not possible to say with any exactness. The Twentieth Century League estimated in 1903 that in London about 27,780 boys were connected with institutions of this character, and we shall see later that there are in London about 120,000 boys between the ages of fourteen and eighteen.
It would be no less difficult to weigh the value of the work done. Existing as they do on a voluntary basis, and free from all element of compulsion, such supervision as they exert must take the form of tactful guidance. Their success or failure depends less on the machinery and more on the personal qualities of the manager. The wide and admirable influence of the best clubs is the triumph, not of the system, but of the exceptional individual. Exceptional individuals are, it must be remembered, exceptional, and an organization which depends on their presence is necessarily limited in the extent of its operations. We cannot therefore look to these associations to meet adequately the call for supervision.
Of recent years numerous associations have been formed with the object of providing suitable openings for boys. There are two sides to their work. On the one hand, situations are found, terms made with employers as to wages and training, and steps taken to see that these terms are carried out. On the other hand, periodic visits are paid to the boy in his home, advice given as to attendance at evening schools, and friendly relations established between boy and visitor. In general, these bodies are concerned with placing out lads in skilled trades, though here and there some attempts have been made to attack the better parts of the unskilled labour market. Work of this character entails the expenditure of much time and money, and requires for the negotiation with employers considerable technical qualifications. Experience has shown that a staff of volunteers cannot alone perform the necessary duties, and paid officers have been appointed. The cost necessarily limits the expansion of the organization. Out of the 30,000 boys who annually leave the elementary schools of London, it is probable that not more than 2 per cent. come under the influence of these associations. On the other hand, if the sphere of their operations is limited, within that sphere it has achieved very considerable success. They have been pioneers in a new movement, have fully justified their existence, and must now look to the State to continue on a larger scale, but on the same general lines, the work that they have begun. Unlike most volunteers, these employment committees welcome this transfer, and arenow readily placing their services at the disposal of the Board of Trade through its juvenile Labour Exchange.
This brief survey of the contribution of philanthropic enterprise to the apprenticeship of to-day reveals one obvious conclusion: the associations only touch a fringe of the problem, and in no way exert any comprehensive measure of control over the lads between the ages of fourteen and eighteen. Their number, their variety, and their enthusiasm, indicate the urgent need of supervision rather than supervision successfully achieved. We cannot look to them to supplement in any large degree the defects in the scheme of State guardianship, or the more grave defects which will appear when the conditions of home and workshop have been passed in review.
III.
The Contribution of the Home.
What contribution does the home make to the solution of the apprenticeship question? We cannot, indeed, expect to find within the walls of the home provision made for the general education of the boy, or the specialized training of the youth; but it is not unnatural to look to the parent to exercise supervision over his children till manhood is reached, and likewise to offer to the boy leaving school advice and material assistance in the selection of a trade. We are still inclined to regard the family as the one relic of the patriarchal system that has retained a vigorous vitality through all the ages; we arestill apt to see in the home a small world, edged off from the large world outside, self-centred, self-ruled, and enjoying all the advantages of a benevolent despotism.
To what extent is this general assumption justified by the results of actual experience? The question is of profound importance, and has not received the attention it deserves from those who have written on boy labour. If we can take it for granted that in the normal home we have the means of controlling the boy and the growing lad up till the age of eighteen, we have a solid foundation on which to rest the new apprenticeship. Abnormal homes may need attention; but if the problem of supervision is solved for the majority, if there is an authority to which the boy submits himself as a matter of course, to add training and to organize openings are tasks which should present no serious difficulty.
Can we look to the home to provide this fundamental basis of a true apprenticeship system? To answer this question we must study the homes themselves. A few years ago I devoted a large amount of time to the collection of material touching the character of family life in towns. The results were published in an essay entitled “The Boy and the Family.”[94]I may perhaps be allowed to summarize the conclusions there established.
Home varies from home; each may be said to have its own individuality, but each has much in common. To give definiteness to the problem, I endeavoured toclass the homes under three types. In the main, type number one referred to the inhabitants of one and two room tenements; type number two embraced the families possessing three rooms; while the third type included those persons fortunate enough to rent more than three rooms. The size of the home proved a rough, though the best attainable, method of classifying the characteristics of the inmates.
Supervision has been interpreted to mean two things—supervision of health and supervision of conduct.
So far as the supervision of health is concerned, it is probable that very few of the parents belonging to the three types possess the necessary knowledge to carry out this duty. Among all classes of the community ignorance on matters affecting the hygiene of the home is almost universal. But even if knowledge were present, the resources at the disposal of large numbers would prove inadequate to make that knowledge effective. With type number one overcrowding is the rule; with type number two it is common; and only in the third type do we reach conditions of housing favourable to health.
The experience derived from medical inspection of school-children and the administration of the Provision of Meals Act has revealed the deplorable condition of large numbers of children when left to the unaided care of their parents. The returns of necessitous children fed, which are published weekly in the minutes of the London County Council, showed that during the winter of 1909-10at the time of most acute distress, about 9 per cent. of the children in the schools were receiving meals. A careful inquiry, the most elaborate of its kind, made into the home circumstances of the necessitous children in certain schools showed that the number of children actually fed was probably below, and certainly not above, the number who required meals. The same inquiry, with its lurid pictures of squalor and distress, proved how small was the prospect of health for many of those children, even though they were fed at school. It may be regarded as a conclusive demonstration of the call for more searching regulation on the part of the State.[95]It is probable, however, that the need for food is far larger than that represented by the number of children actually fed. Several inquiries, such as those carried out by Mr. Charles Booth in London, and Mr. Rowntree in York, indicate that the effective income of nearly a third of the population is too small to supply in adequate quantity even the bare necessities of existence.
Medical inspection is now revealing the number of children suffering from definite ailments, and urgently requiring medical treatment, which they have hitherto been unable, in a large proportion of cases, to obtain. It would appear that some 10 per cent. suffer from defective vision, about 1 per cent. from discharging ears, about the same number from ringworm, while at least athird are suffering in health from the result of decaying teeth.[96]
Everywhere we have abundant evidence to show that, from want of supervision, or of the effective means of supervision in the home, large numbers of children are growing up ill-clad, ill-nourished, and suffering from definite diseases, all alike leading to inefficient manhood.
The second department of supervision is concerned with the supervision of character. Can we rest satisfied that the parents exercise over the growing lads that salutary control all growing lads require? The question is of profound importance, if, as all agree, character is the condition of success when the first steps are taken in the industrial world. It is necessary to distinguish between the boy attending school and the boy exempt from compulsory attendance. In what follows I shall draw largely on my essay in “Studies of Boy Life.” The conclusions are derived from the experience of many years’ residence in a poor part of London, and have been tested by a careful inquiry among ministers of religion, school-teachers, rent-collectors, and others with special knowledge of the subject.
§ 1. THE BOY OF SCHOOL AGE.
If the parents are to control the boys, the boys must come much under the personal influence of the parents;in other words, rulers and ruled must meet frequently. Now, in all three types of family the father exercises little direct control over the children. If of good character, he is either out at work or out looking for work during five days of the week, and sees the children only in the evening. On Saturday afternoons and on Sundays he is at home; but a week-end visitor cannot be the dominant factor in domestic affairs. If control is exercised, it must be exercised by the mother. To trace her influence, it is necessary to picture the kind of life led by each type. I quote from my essay:
“So far as the first type is considered, it is not easy to say when the children and parents meet.... The general order of events is something as follows: If it is one of the days on which he elects to work, the father rises about five o’clock, finds his own breakfast, and then quits the house. Some two or three hours later the school-children get out of bed, wash their faces, take a slice of bread and dripping, and go out. Sometimes the mother rises at that time and gets the breakfast, but in most cases remains in bed. At nine the boys go to school. At noon school is over, and the boys, after amusing themselves in the playground or street for an hour, go home to get some food. The mother meanwhile has risen, dressed the smaller children, performed the irreducible minimum of domestic work, and then left the house to gossip with a neighbour, or earn a few pence by charing. On rare occasions she may cook the children some dinner, but as a rule they get what food they canfind, and eat it in the streets. Sometimes they receive a halfpenny to buy their own meal at a fried-fish shop. The boys then return to school, escape at half-past four, possibly go home to tea, and then once more turn for amusement to the streets. There they remain until it is dark, and often in summer till dawn begins to break, when at length they seek their dwelling and go to bed. In many cases the boys do not find their way back to their own houses, but take up their quarters for the night in the house of some friend. Sometimes they do not sleep in a house at all. In one case of which I have heard three boys spent a fortnight in a wash-house on the top of some blocks. There they lived an independent existence, getting their food and attending school regularly all the while. Later on, being discovered by a policeman, they were sent to their respective families.... Week follows week with little variation to mark the march of time. As brief a fragment of the boy’s life as is possible is spent within the common dwelling, which offers him no occupation, and is entirely devoid of interest or attraction. The mother does not demand his presence indoors, while he himself has no wish to be there. The street, and not the house, ought probably to be regarded as the home or meeting-place of the family.”[97]
Supervision under circumstances of this kind must be an almost negligible factor in the life of the home. Let us now come to the second type. I quote again:
“In the second type, as already mentioned, the family usually occupies three rooms. At first sight the conditions found in the former type seem to prevail here also. Indeed, as a matter of fact, the boys spend hardly more time at home than those just considered. Out of school hours they are either in the street or employed in some form of paid work.... School, street, meals, and bed alternate with one another here in much the same way as they did in the first type. But while the facts remain for the most part unchanged, their setting and colouring are very different. Another atmosphere seems to pervade the whole life; some sense of order and regularity begins to manifest itself; meals are at fixed hours; and the boys are expected home and sent to bed at more or less definite times. They return to their own tenements, and do not spend the night with some of their neighbours. As will appear later, home interests begin to develop; and if the boys spend their leisure in the streets, this is due more to their own choice than to the wish of their parents.... The mother does not display the utter indifference to the state of the dwelling or the habits of the children conspicuous in the first type. Some sort of ideal of home she seems to possess, but to obtain this ideal is beyond her power. She has the look of one who feels that things are wrong, and yet can see no remedy. She notes, for example, the evil influence the street exerts on the characters of her boys, but does not know how to preserve them from its overwhelming attractions.”[98]
“The chief difference, then, between the first and second type lies not so much in a different kind of life as in a certain change of atmosphere that pervades and transforms the common existence. In the third type this change of atmosphere becomes more conspicuous. A great part of the boy’s time is, indeed, still spent outside the dwelling-place, but the life at home begins to assume larger proportions. There is more order and quiet in the house—a condition which reacts favourably on the boys. They are no longer seen hanging about the streets, loafing at the corners, or shouting noisily in the gutters. Though much out of doors, they go farther afield, and visit parks or museums; while, if they stay near home, they will usually be discovered in the school playground. In the evening many of them are indoors, and have various occupations, of which, perhaps, reading is the chief.”[99]
In type number one, then, there is, for all practical purposes, a complete absence of supervision. In the second type there is a desire for supervision, but the narrowness of the house accommodation thrusts the boys into the streets. In the third type alone are the conditions favourable to supervision.
§ 2. THE BOY AFTER SCHOOL DAYS.
If the boy while at school is under little parental control, it is not to be expected that this control will be tightened when school days are over. With the firsttype of family there was no supervision before, and there is no more afterwards. The boy is self-supporting, and troubles little about the home, and the home troubles little about him. There is a partial exception in the case of the coster. Here the boy may become one of the regular working members of the establishment, and remains with his father; but the discipline is of a rude and ready sort.
With the second type of family the boy’s earnings are of great importance to the family, and the mother does her best to keep him at home. Any exercise of discipline is avoided, lest the lad should take his earnings and go elsewhere. He is rather in the position of a favoured lodger, whose presence is valuable to the home, and who must be treated well for fear he should give notice.
In the third type of family, the boy, with growing years, passes out of the control of the mother, and is resentful of any restraint exerted by a woman. What supervision he enjoys comes from the father. The two do not meet often; father and son are seldom employed together, and the long distance that frequently separates home and work places the boy beyond the reach of parental control during the greater portion of the week.
Such in broad outline, rendered jagged, no doubt, by numerous exceptions, is the quantity and the quality of the supervision exercised by the town parent over the town boy. Even with the highest type no high standard is reached, while with the lower we cannot contemplate the picture with any degree of satisfaction. Speakinggenerally, the city-bred youth is growing up in a state of unrestrained liberty; and what makes the problem more serious is the fact that all evidence goes to show that this disquieting phenomenon is not an accident, but the direct product of the social and industrial conditions of the times. Towns are growing larger, and with the growth of towns the whole conditions of family life are being transformed. The old patriarchal system is gone; the father is no longer an autocratic ruler in his small world. The family, so to say, has become democratized; we have in it an association of equals in authority. Now, the most ardent advocates of the extension of the suffrage have always limited their demands to an appeal for adult suffrage; they have never clamoured for children to be given a vote. Yet this, for all effective purposes, is what happens in the home in the case of the boy as soon as he has left school. The status of wage-earner has brought with it the status of manhood, and his earnings have conferred on him immunity from control and the right to be consulted in the politics of the home. Another fact, not sufficiently recognized, tends to break down the patriarchal system. With the steady improvement in the State schools, the boy is usually better educated than the father; the father knows this, and the boy knows it too.
It is idle, therefore, to look for any large amount of parental control over the boy who has left school. We must face realities, however unpleasant these realities may happen to be; and one of the realities of the time isthe independence of the lad. What is equally significant is the suddenness with which this independence comes. Until the age of fourteen he has remained under a carefully designed system of State supervision, exerted by the school authorities; while in a large number of cases the discipline of the home has been an important factor in his existence. At the age of fourteen, as a general rule, the control of school and home end together. The lad goes to bed a boy; he wakes as a man. There should therefore be little cause for surprise if the habits of the school and home are rapidly sloughed off in the new life of irresponsible freedom.
Whether, therefore, we look to the State, to philanthropic enterprise, or to the home, we find no satisfactory guarantee for the supervision of the youth of the country. We have yet to search for this supervision in the workshop; but if it is absent there, we shall be faced with the disquieting phenomenon of the boy at the age of fourteen enjoying the full and complete independence of the adult.
IV.
The Contribution of the Workshop.
Having examined three out of the four factors which contribute to the apprenticeship of to-day, and found them all inadequate, we must now turn to the workshop in the hope that we shall discover there conditions more favourable to the well-being of the youth of the country. If, however, this last factor prove defective, theapprenticeship of to-day will stand condemned, and the case for drastic reform will become unanswerable. It will therefore be desirable to devote considerable space to this, the central feature of the problem of boy labour.
In what follows it is proposed first to make a detailed study of conditions in London, and then to present a general picture of the state of boy labour in other parts of the country. London has been selected for a detailed study because in a peculiar degree it represents the extreme type of urbanization. There is also the advantage that in the case of London the material required for the examination has to a large extent been collected. The investigations of Mr. Charles Booth, the publications and inquiries on the subject carried out by the London County Council, Mr. Cyril Jackson’s report on boy labour presented to the Poor Law Commission, and numerous other writings, have provided for the study of London a mass of information which, though not in all respects exhaustive, is more complete than can be found elsewhere.
§ 1. LONDON.
A study of the problem of boy labour in London involves the study of three questions. First we have to consider the case of the children who, while still attending school, are employed for wages. Next we must devote special attention to the boys as they leave school and distribute themselves among the different occupations. Finally, we must watch the later career of those lads,and in particular endeavour to ascertain in what way and with what results is made the difficult passage from the status of the youth to the status of the man.
(a)The Employment of School-Children.
In London the half-time system is not permitted. The standard of attainment for total exemption has been made sufficiently high to prevent the great majority of boys from leaving school till the age of fourteen is reached. It is, however, a fact that improved methods of instruction and more rapid promotion from class to class are tending to lower the age at which it is possible to obtain a Labour Certificate. How far this opportunity is used it is not easy to say; but in certain schools, situated in the poorer districts, it is alleged that there is a growing tendency for the brighter children to claim exemption in this way. The regularity of attendance is admirable, the average attendance in boys’ schools exceeding 90 per cent. We may therefore assume that, if the boys work for wages, they must work at times when the schools are not opened.
To what extent are boys employed while still liable to attend school? In 1899 a return was obtained throughout the elementary schools of England and Wales of the number of children so employed. In London, in the case of boys, the figures were 21,755.[100]The tables also give the ages of the children, but boys and girls are notseparated. If, however, we assume that the number of children of each sex at each age is proportionate to the total number of children of each sex at all ages, we find that 78 per cent. of the boys were eleven and upwards, and 22 per cent. under eleven. The number of boys of eleven and upwards would be about 17,000. There are in the elementary schools about 70,000 boys eleven years of age and upwards, so that about 24 per cent. of these boys are employed. In other words, nearly a quarter of the boys in the elementary schools above the age of eleven were employed at the time of the return. The actual number of boys who are employed during the course of their school career would be considerably larger, as they would not all be employed at the same moment. The return is more than ten years old, but, with the exception of the children under eleven, it is improbable that there has been much change. Similar figures may be deduced from the Report of the Interdepartmental Committee on the Employment of School-Children, 1901.[101]
With regard to the number of hours worked, Miss Adler’s evidence is selected, and typical schools show that 56 per cent. were employed for more than twenty hours a week, while 14 per cent. were employed thirty-five hours or upwards.[102]In individual cases the figures were much higher. “Thus a boy of eleven years of age, for four shillings a week, was employed for forty-threeand three-quarter hours in carrying parcels from a chemist’s shop, and, except on Sundays, was practically every moment of his life at school or at work from seven in the morning till nine o’clock at night. Another boy, aged thirteen, worked fifty-two hours a week, being employed by a moulding company, and attending a theatre for five evenings a week and for half a day on Wednesday for amatinée—for the last, however, playing truant from school.”[103]The following graphic account taken from a school composition, and obtained under circumstances which guarantee its essential accuracy, shows the amount of work which may be compressed into a single day. It refers to Saturday:
“I first got up from bed about half-past six, and put my clothes on and had a wash. Then I went to work at B.’s, and swept out his shop, and then I did the window out. But after I done the window I had my breakfast and went in the shop again. I started taking out orders that came in. While I was taking the orders out, Mr. B. went to the Borough market for some potatoes, cabbages, and some onions; but when he came home I had to unload his van. After I unloaded his van, he went for some coal, which he sells at one and sixpence a hundredweight, but he got two tons of coal in. Then we had dinner about one o’clock. When we had our dinner, I had a rest till about four o’clock, when I had tea. When I had my tea I had to go and chop some wood, when it was time to shut up the shop. I had my supper andwent home, and went to bed, and the time was about twelve o’clock.”[104]It will be seen that, with the exception of a break in the middle of the day, the boy was on duty for nearly three-quarters of the twenty-four hours, and for part of the time was engaged in heavy manual labour.
What effect does employment have on the physical condition of children under the age of fourteen? “That excessive employment is injurious alike to the education and to the health of the children is hardly in question. It was testified to by witness after witness, many of them in no way likely to be influenced by merely theoretical objections to child labour.”[105]On the other hand, most of the witnesses that appeared before the Interdepartmental Committee were of opinion that “moderate work” was in many cases not only not injurious, but “positively beneficial.”[106]It is not easy to understand what is meant by the last statement. If some form of employment is beneficial, then the 76 per cent. who are not so employed suffer, and steps should be taken to encourage them to work. It is doubtful whether the witnesses would have accepted this conclusion, from which, on their own assumptions, there is really no escape. The difficulty lay in drawing the line. “Most of the witnesses seemed to suggest that twenty hours might be fixed as the maximum weekly limit; but, on the other hand, we found some cases where less than twenty hours a week, ifconcentrated in one or two days, or if done at night, must be injurious.”[107]
But the evidence of most value on the subject is to be found in a Report of the Medical Officer of the London County Council.[108]About 400 boys employed outside school hours were examined. The following table, with defects in percentages, was obtained as the result:[109]
It will be seen that the defects rise rapidly with increase in the hours of work; while, even in the case of those working less than twenty hours, there is a serious deviation from the average. The fact that 50 per cent. of those working less than twenty hours should exhibit signs of fatigue, even where no permanent physical evil results, must seriously affect the value of the schoolinstruction. In every case the workers compare unfavourably with the average for the whole of the workers and non-workers. We cannot view with satisfaction the truth that, even in those employed with moderation, deformities and severe heart signs should be nearly 50 per cent. above the average. The medical officer adds other conclusions no less disquieting. “Working eight hours on Saturday is as inimical as thirty hours during the week, and working through the dinner-hour appears particularly productive of anæmia,”[110]“Retardation in school work was noted in 209 out of these 330 boys, 86 being one standard, 83 two standards, 37 three standards, and 3 four standards behind that corresponding to their age.”[111]As his final conclusion the medical officer states: “We must set up as an ideal the suppression of child labour below twelve years of age, and during school life regulate it to twenty hours weekly, and a maximum of five hours on any one day.”[112]The figures, however, would seem to go far in justifying the more drastic remedy of complete prohibition.
It is, however, fair to mention that the Report of the Interdepartmental Committee, and also the Report of the Medical Officer, refer to a state of affairs prior to the passing of the Employment of Children Act. Under this Act, as explained in the last chapter,[113]employment of children under the age of eleven is forbidden, while the by-laws of the Council place restrictions on the numberof hours children may work, and the times of day during which such work may be carried on. It is too soon to judge of the extent to which these restrictions can be enforced. During the first year of effective operation in London there were, in respect of boys under the age of sixteen, 13,461 cases of infringement. Prohibition under a certain age or during certain times of the day is comparatively easy to enforce; but limitation of hours, as experience of the Shop Act shows, is extremely difficult to enforce, and peculiarly difficult where, as with school-children, persons are not employed regularly, but work irregularly at times when the schools are not open. To get evidence sufficient to justify convictions is almost impossible, except in a few outrageous cases.
What, if any, effect does the employment of school-children have on the general question of the preparation for a trade? Into this general question the Interdepartmental Committee did not enter. They did indeed regard certain forms of occupation as injurious, while they pronounced as beneficial employment in moderation. But this statement has apparently reference only to matters of health, and not to the relation of employment during school days to employment afterwards. The question is of great importance, as habits, in respect of work for wages, formed by the boy cling persistently to the youth. It is necessary, therefore, to pay some attention to the characteristics of the work which schoolboys undertake. In London 90 per cent. of the workwould be included in the three following classes: (1) Shops—errand-running and delivery of parcels, milk, newspapers, and watching the goods spread on the counters outside the shops; (2) domestic—knife and boot cleaning, and occasionally baby-minding; and (3) street employment—hawking of newspapers, matches, and flowers, organ-grinding, and the like. Now, none of these forms of occupation provide any trade-training, or offer an opening with satisfactory prospects, to the boy as he leaves school. On the other hand, this class of work has distinctly injurious effects. First, it is employment of a casual character. Affected as it is, on the one hand, by attendance at school, and on the other by Saturdays and holidays, it is essentially irregular as regards hours. Secondly, it is easy to obtain, and consequently lightly undertaken and lightly dropped. Where another situation can be obtained at will, there is no demand on the worker to display the qualities that make for permanence of employment. Thirdly, it is work in which youths as well as boys are engaged; in other words, it does provide an opening to the boy as he leaves school—an opening which he is likely to accept, because it is the most obvious, but at the same time an opening in one of those forms of occupation entrance into which we should, as will appear later, do our utmost to discourage. It is singularly unfortunate that a boy’s first association with any kind of paid employment should be of this nature. And, finally, it is at least open to grave doubt whether that sense of independence of home which comes withthe consciousness of earning wages should begin at as early an age as twelve or thirteen.
It would not be easy to imagine a more unsatisfactory form of preparation for a trade than that provided by the kind of work carried out by wage-earning children. If we add to this demoralizing influence the injurious effect on health and education, the case for total prohibition of boy labour during school-days becomes very strong.
(b)The Entry to a Trade.
The great majority of boys remain at the elementary school till they attain the age of fourteen; it is no less true that the vast majority cease attendance as soon as that age is reached. The period of the next four years—that is, from fourteen to eighteen—forms the most critical time of their career. It is during these four years that the boy must, if ever, have taken the first steps towards learning a trade. During this interval his physical strength must mature, his character take on itself a more or less permanent set, and the question whether his education shall represent something more than a faint shadow of early impressions be finally determined. In short, it is during these four years that the future citizen is made or marred.
The previous survey, whether of the factors which contribute to the apprenticeship of to-day, or of the evils which are found among wage-earning school-children, does not guarantee a favourable start in the world of whole-time employment. Each year about 30,000 boysleave school at the age of fourteen to take up some form of work. These figures do not agree with the Census returns, because the latter include all London boys in all classes of society, whether at school or at work. Here we are concerned only with the boys of fourteen who leave the elementary school with the intention of earning their own living. Between the ages of fourteen and eighteen there will therefore be 120,000 boys. It is the careers of these 120,000 boys that we must now try to follow.
What are the first occupations selected by these 120,000 boys? During the last few years the London County Council has endeavoured to find an answer to this question. Each head-master of an elementary school is required annually to fill up a form in respect of each boy who has left the school during the preceding twelve months. The information asked for is “occupation of parent,” “occupation of boy,” “whether skilled or unskilled,” or “whether a place of higher education is attended.” Returns have been received and summarized for the years 1906-07 and 1907-08. The first return was incomplete, but the second included the vast majority of those who left. Below is given the summary for the two years:
It will be seen that, including those who went to some higher form of education, little more than a third of the boys left school to enter a skilled trade.[114]
Table I.
It is unfortunate that no full analysis has been made of these returns. The value of the information which would have thus been obtained was not supposed to justify the labour and expenditure involved in such an analysis. I have, however, roughly analyzed nearly4,000 cases, and endeavoured to classify the occupations, in accordance with the table founded on the Census return which will be given later.[115]I selected for this purpose typical districts in London. Table I. includes returns from all the schools in the electoral areas of Bermondsey, North Camberwell, and Walworth; it represents a typical miscellaneous working-class district. Table II. includes the electoral areas of Dulwich and Lewisham; it may be regarded as typical of suburban villadom so far as its inhabitants send their children to the elementary schools. Table III. includes the electoral areas of Whitechapel and St. George’s-in-the-East, districts distinguished by the presence of a large number of small trades and sweated industries. Table IV. includes the collective results of the three preceding tables, and may be taken as fairly typical of London as a whole. It was necessary to exclude the returns of a few schools as incomplete, indefinite, or obviously inaccurate. Parent stands for occupation of parent, boy for occupation of boy. The two do not quite correspond, as in a certain number of instances the occupation of the parent was unknown. I have included the telegraph-boys under “Transport,” as for my purpose this classification was the more suitable.
Table II.