SCHOOL CHILDREN AS WAGE EARNERS

THE following paper is based on information collected by a special committee called for that purpose by the Women's Industrial Council. The facts and figures here set forth are actually those presented to the Council; but for any opinions or inferences here expressed the writer alone is responsible, inasmuch as neither the committee nor the council have as yet dealt finally with the question, and there is plenty of room for individual differences of opinion.

The committee in question included head teachers; representatives of three settlements,' and of the Toynbee Economic Club; and school managers interested in the inquiry; and every effort was made to ensure that the information might be as thorough as the circumstances permitted.

Fifty-four schools were selected of varying type, representing different conditions of poverty, of industry, and population. It must be borne in mind from the outset that the figures apply exclusively to children who are earning a wage, however nominal; it does not cover the numbers who are employed by their own parents unpaid, and it touches only those who are in theory working full school hours.

As to the accuracy of the figures, it is believed that so far as they go they may safely be trusted. But it must be remembered that there is often a considerable reluctance to admit any fact at all when the intention of the inquirer is not fully understood and his official authority is not palpably-even dangerously-evident.

The reports received from the different schools vary greatly in their completeness and in precision of detail. Questions as to age, school standards, attendances, &c., have sometimes been answered, sometimes not. Averages, therefore,[have been drawn from the figures supplied, and might require some revision if the whole of the information could be placed before us.

The total of children in round numbers among whom the inquiry has been made is: boys 16,000, girls 10,000; the total number ascertained to be working for wages is: boys 729, girls 523-that is, roughly speaking, about 5 per cent. If at first sight this seems a small number, it must be remembered that the real question goes beyond that of wage earners. That, taken by itself, is little more than an index to the habit of working school children generally.

Our first table, A, at once suggests the need of modifying these percentages.

Table A. Proportion of wage-earning children below and above Standard IV. out of a total return of 729 boys and 230 girls

In several cases, the numbers given show only those in the higher standards; so that the total of wage earners should evidently be increased. The table itself is an example of incomplete information, as of course it covers only those reports in which the standards have been entered; but it shows the girls beginning work earlier, and at a more backward stage of education than the boys. Of the girls over 11, the majority have not yet passed Standard IV.; of the boys, seven out of twelve have passed it.

Table B. (1) Number of hours worked by children under 11 years of age

(2) Number of hours worked by children over 11 years of age

Our second table shows the number of hours during which the children are kept at work.

Now, to take the boys to begin with, the first point that must strike us, relatively to the percentage given above, is that of the boys nearly four out of five of the wage earners are over 11; therefore 4 'per cent. of all the boys on the rolls are wage earners over 11. So that evidently far more than 5 per cent. of the boys over 11-boys, that is, who have just come to the age when the advantages of education are beginning to multiply—are spending their time out of school as newspaper or errand boys and what not.

Next with reference to the number of hours employed. The detailed reports show that an uncertain' period of employment on school days often means employment before school, at mid-day, and after school for an indefinite number of hours as required.' This is almost invariably true in those districts where child labour is in request for domestic industries.

'Uncertain' hours on Saturdays mean, in a vast number of cases, 'all day.' That is to say, these cases would, if accurately returned, be scheduled as twelve hours and over. Of the 249 boys who are returned under the heading of twelve hours and over, 220 are employed in shops and fifteen as barbers' assistants. Of these, thirtynine work sixteen hours and over.

Nineteen, all milk, stable, market, or newspaper boys, work for more than three hours before school—that is, work begins at 5 or 5.30 A.M., in a few cases even earlier. Thus a butcher's boy goes to market at 4 A.M. every day, and shouts 'buy, buy' outside a stall till late at night, coming to school' voiceless and stupid.' Another 'minds carts' at Covent Garden from 4-8.30 A.M. A. L., aged 11, delivers milk from 5.30-8.30 A.M. and from 5-9 P.M. on school days, and all Saturday. T. F., aged 9, sells papers from 6.30-9 A.M., from 5-8 P.M., and for sixteen hours on Saturday. G. S., aged 12, 'trades on his own account,' and sells papers from 5-11.30 P.M. daily, and for fifteen hours on Saturday. L. N. works at a fried fish shop all hours when not at school.' Thirty-eight boys work till midnight on Saturdays. These are all shop boys or barbers' assistants. In one school which returns a total of thirty wage earners, sixteen work over twelve

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hours on Saturdays, seven of these for fourteen hours and over, three for sixteen hours, and one for seventeen hours.

When we come to the question of wages there are no exact data from which to draw definite conclusions, but a rough approximation would be as follows: Delivering newspapers and milk, 1d.-14d. per hour; street selling, d.; errands, d.; shop boys, 1d.-1fd.; carrying and delivering coal, 1d. Sometimes food is given in addition, but this and the rate of payment seem to be purely an arbitrary arrangement. For instance, one boy takes out vegetables and serves at a greengrocer's from 8-9.30 A.M., from 12-1 P.M., from 5-7 P.M. daily, and for twelve hours on Saturday, for 38.; while a boy of 9 is employed at a newspaper shop from 6-8 P.M. daily for d.

One boy chops lump-sugar for an uncertain number of hours for 2d. every evening; another cuts chaff for, apparently, the same time for 4d, a week.

R. A., aged 10, serves at a second-hand clothes stall in the street from 8 A.M.-12 P.M. on Saturdays for 6d.; S. P., aged 12, serves at an oilman's every night till 10 o'clock for 3s. a week.

A boy of 8 delivers morning milk for 18. 6d. a week; but one of 11, going round to sell with a milk-barrow from 6-8.30 A.M., from 12–1 P.M., and from 5-6 P.M. on week days and Sundays, makes 38. 6d. and food. A barber's boy, whose hours are from 5-10 P.M. daily, and all Saturday and part of Sunday, makes 2s. 6d. and food.

We should expect a boy following the magnificent profession of a 'tea traveller' to make more than 1s. 6d. for a thirteen hours' day, and it is a surprise to find that 'general work' in a private house commands a rate of payment of less than d. an hour. But with the boys, and to a more serious extent with the girls, it is in the home industries that we find the lowest pay combined with the longest hours; and boys employed as furniture and marble polishers, artificial flower, match and fancy box makers, boot sewers, &c., appear to work at every possible moment of the day and night with only a few pence at the end of the week to show for it.

Turning to the girls, the still larger proportion scheduled as 'uncertain,' both as to hours and wages, makes the results obtained decidedly less precise and informing. Moreover, the reports bear on them, with increased emphasis and frequency, reference to the children being employed not strictly as wage earners, but to help in the house' of neighbours or relations for food, stray articles of clothing, and casual coppers. In one school, where only twelve are returned as regular wage earners, 'nearly all' are said to be employed as above described.

From another school, in which sixty-two girls out of a total of 418 are returned as wage earners, comes the report that many of these girls are too heavily taxed for their strength; in fact, some of them have no real childhood, but are baby-minding, or taking home work,

or meals to parents and elder brothers and sisters morning, noon, and night.' From a school where, out of a total of 307 girls, sixty-five are returned as out working at all hours in industries such as steel stitching, artificial flower-making, beadwork, furwork, box-making, paper-bag making and boot-sewing, we get the following opinion: 'No doubt all this nightwork unfits the girls for schoolwork, but possibly it is a necessary evil, as it keeps the girls out of the streets, and away from the quarrels of their parents at home.'

In another district seventy-four girls out of a total of 415 are returned, all employed in baby-minding, 'fetching errands,' and housework. Baby-minding often includes scrubbing a room, and housework and errands go hand in hand.

The time employed is usually an hour at midday, two to four hours after school, and all day' Saturday. The payment may be anything from 2d. to 6d. a week, the elder girls in exceptional cases making 28. to 2s. 6d. The wages of these girls are purely arbitrary, and will often vary 60 per cent. in the same street. To quote from one report:

The difference between the wages of the boys and the girls is not merely the beginning of that difference which is so strongly marked between the wages of men and women, but is a consequence of the fact that, while the boys accept employment largely in order to earn a little money, the wages are a subordinate consideration in the case of the girls. It seems to the mothers only natural that a girl should help to clean, or baby-mind; and if there is no need of her services at home, then she can 'oblige' a neighbour. In the latter case she may get 6d., instead of ld. or 2d. from her mother; but even if only 2d. or 3d. were offered, she would do the work all the same.

From another school which gives a return of twenty-three girls in and above Standard IV., out of a school total of 193, comes the following report: The employment appears to consist in helping neighbours in or a little above their own circumstances.'

The following examales will serve to illustrate the extreme irregularity of payment:

M. B., aged 10, minds a baby for six and a half hours daily and for thirteen hours on Saturday, for 6d. and food. L. N., aged 9, for two hours daily and eleven hours on Saturday, for 2d. without food. S. E., aged 9, for five hours daily, all Saturday, and all Sunday for 6d. B. P., aged 7, helps a landlady to clean 'for several-hours daily for 'a few pence a week.' F. C., aged 12, for two hours every day for 18. G. S., aged 11, serves every night for four and a half hours in a shop

for 18. C. D. turns a mangle for three and a half hours daily and for ten hours on Saturday for 2d. and her food.

Nor are the conclusions much more definite with regard to girls in home industries. S. P., aged 9, works for four hours daily at quill-winding, and makes 6d. L. E., aged 10, does needlework for the same number of hours for 3d. Children of 7 to 10 years of

age