Health of the War Worker
1942-04 1942 1940s 44 pages tion committee, on a pit or yard committee, or local departmental committee to deal with health questions. It may sometimes be found useful to set up a special health sub-committee for this purpose, which will investigate conditions and report problems and suggestions to...
| Institution: | MCR - The Modern Records Centre, University of Warwick |
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| Language: | English English |
| Published: |
London : Labour Research Department
April 1942
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| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | http://hdl.handle.net/10796/5A9D3A22-ECE9-45C8-88AA-25BCC1CC0C84 http://hdl.handle.net/10796/CFAE54F2-869D-46D2-A170-80DAB9DB89B3 |
| Summary: | 1942-04
1942
1940s
44 pages
tion committee, on a pit or yard committee, or local departmental committee to deal with health questions. It may sometimes be found useful to set up a special health sub-committee for this purpose, which will investigate conditions and report problems and suggestions to the main committee. The job of trade unionists in this field is to be informed on health matters in general, especially the legal requirements, and to know thoroughly the conditions of work throughout their own factory or place of work, making their own inspections if possible. They should then make themselves responsible for securing and maintaining healthy working conditions in every part of the plant. It is especially important that women trade unionists should be drawn into this work. Health is essentially a matter for the trade union organization to take up. If it is left solely to a welfare committee, on which the management is strongly represented and the workers are only called in to advise, it may be difficult to get effective action taken. There should be no hesitation, however, to consult and co-operate with factory doctors and nurses on this matter; they are experts whose advice will often be found indispensable. Early detection and treatment of all sorts of illnesses, for example, can only be secured by co-operation between workers and health staff in this way. The trade union representatives should insist on the management keeping proper health and absenteeism statistics to which they can have access. Enforcing the Law One of the main tasks of the committee is to see that the Factories Act and the wartime Orders are enforced, and where necessary extended to cover new processes and conditions. Every factory is visited from time to time by a Factory Inspector, who is responsible for seeing that the law is kept.* But the number of inspectors is very low (in 1938 there were 253,000 factories and workshops and only 307 inspectors), so that factories are seldom visited more than once a year, if then. Workers have to be wide awake to see that the law is kept all the year round and not just on the special occasion of the inspector's visit. *The Inspector has power also to direct firms to set up or improve canteens, to provide better A.R.P. arrangements, and to insist on certain hours for young workers and women. 36
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| Physical Description: | TEXT |