Health & Safety Learning Journey
During the early years of the Industrial Revolution little heed was paid to health and safety within the working environment. Erecting safety fences, stopping machinery for cleaning, regulating temperatures in the work place, providing sanitation facilities and drinking water, allowing employees adequate breaks and time off, all cost money and received scant attention in an age when large profits were of foremost concern and working people were of little consequence.
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Health & Safety Learning Journey Step 2: Apprentices and the first Factory Act 1802
It was cheaper to employ young people and often at least the half the employees at a mill were usually children. Children started work from the age of seven upwards and would be signed up as apprentices until their 21st birthdays. Many of them did not learn a proper trade however, but were simply regarded as a form of cheap labour. The very first Factory Act was passed in 1802 under the quaint name of the 'Health and Morals of Apprentices Act.' This was mostly aimed at apprentices working in cotton and woollen mills and laid down the following legislation which the mill-owners had to observe: apprentices' s working days were to be limited to twelve hours between 6am-9pm apprentices had to be provided with daily schooling in reading, writing and arithmetic two sets of clothes had to be provided for each apprentice male and female apprentices had to sleep in different rooms and no more than two children could sleep in one bed on Sundays apprentices were to be 'instructed in the principles of Christian religion' factory rooms were to be properly ventilated and whitewashed twice a year infectious diseases were to be treated and reported Did this work? Some apprentices fared better than others. The Gregs of Quarry Bank Mill appear to have treated their child apprentices reasonably well but there were still problems about working hours; time to attend lessons; and time off. On this web site read the evidence of working conditions given by Joseph Sefton and Thomas Priestley, two young apprentices who ran away from Quarry Bank Mill in 1806. |
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