Labour Conventions). [H.L.]

ARRANGEMENT OF CLAUSES.

Clause.

1. Amendment of s. 158 of Merchant Shipping Act, 1894.

2. Employment of young persons as trimmers or stokers.

3. Medical examination of young persons.

4. Penalties.

5. Interpretation.

6. Power to apply Act to British possessions.

7. Short title and construction.

SCHEDULES.

(International Labour Conventions). [H.L.]

A

BILL

INTITULED

An Act to give effect to certain Draft Conventions A.D. 1924. adopted by the International Labour Conference relating respectively to an unemployment indemnity for seamen in the case of loss or foundering of their ship, the minimum age for the admission of young persons to employment as trimmers and stokers, and the compulsory medical examination of children and young persons employed at sea.

WE

HEREAS at Genoa the General Conference of the International Labour Organisation of the League of Nations on the ninth day of July, nineteen hundred and twenty, adopted a draft convention concerning 5 unemployment indemnity for seamen in case of loss or foundering of their ship, and at Geneva on the eleventh day of November, nineteen hundred and twenty-one, adopted two other draft conventions, namely, a draft convention fixing the minimum age for the admission of young 10 persons to employment as trimmers and stokers, and a draft convention concerning the compulsory medical examination of children and young persons employed

at sea:

And whereas the said draft conventions contain 15 (together with other provisions) the provisions set out in Parts I., II. and III. respectively of the First Schedule to this Act:

And whereas it is expedient that for the purpose of giving effect to the said draft conventions such provision 20 should be made as is contained in this Act:

A.D. 1924.

Amendment

Merchant

Shipping

Act, 1894.

(International Labour Conventions).

Be it therefore enacted by the King's most Excellent Majesty, by and with the advice and consent of the Lords Spiritual and Temporal, and Commons, in this present Parliament assembled, and by the authority of the same, as follows:

5

1.-(1) Where by reason of the wreck or loss of a of s. 158 of ship on which a seaman is employed his service terminates before the date contemplated in the agreement, he shall, notwithstanding anything in section one hundred and 57 & 58 Vict. fifty-eight of the Merchant Shipping Act, 1894, but 10 subject to the provisions of this section be entitled, in respect of each day on which he is in fact unemployed during a period of two months from the date of the termination of the service, to receive wages at the rate to which he was entitled at that date. 15

c. 60.

Employment of young persons as trimmers or stokers.

(2) A seaman shall not be entitled to receive wages under this section if the owner shows that the unemployment was not due to the wreck or loss of the ship and shall not be entitled to receive wages under this section in respect of any day if the owner shows that the seaman 20 was able to obtain suitable employment on that day.

(3) In this section the expression " seaman" includes every person employed or engaged in any capacity on board any ship.

2.-(1) Subject to the provisions of this section, no 25 young person shall be employed or work as a trimmer or stoker in any ship:

Provided that

(a) The foregoing provision shall not apply

(i) to the employment of a young person 30 on such work as aforesaid in a school-ship or training-ship if the work is of a kind approved by the Board of Trade and is carried on subject to supervision by officers of the Board; or

(ii) to the employment of a young person on such work as aforesaid in a ship which is mainly propelled otherwise than by means of steam; or

35

(iii) to the employment of a young person 40 subject to and in accordance with the provisions contained in paragraph (c) of Article 3 of the draft convention set out in Part II. of the First Schedule to this Act; and

45

5

10

(International Labour Conventions).

(b) Where in any port a trimmer or stoker is A.D 1924.
required for any ship and no person over the
age of eighteen years is available to fill the
place, a young person over the age of sixteen
years may be employed as a trimmer or
stoker, but in any such case two young
persons over the age of sixteen years shall be
employed to do the work which would other-
wise have been performed by one person over
the age of eighteen years.

(2) There shall be included in every agreement with the crew a list of the young persons who are members of the crew, together with particulars of the dates of their birth, and, in the case of a ship in which there is no such 15 agreement, the master of the ship shall, if young persons are employed therein, keep a register of those persons with particulars of the dates of their birth and of the dates on which they become or cease to be members of the crew.

20

(3) There shall be included in every agreement with the crew a short summary of the provisions of this section.

3.-(1) Subject to the provisions of this section, no Medical young person shall be employed in any capacity in any examination ship, unless there has been delivered to the master of the of young 25 ship a certificate granted by a duly qualified medical persons. practitioner certifying that the young person is fit to be employed in that capacity:

30

335

40

Provided that

(a) the foregoing provisions shall not apply to the
employment of a young person in a ship in
which only members of the same family are
employed; and

(b) a superintendent or consular officer may on
the ground of urgency authorise a young
person to be employed on board a ship notwith-
standing that no such certificate as aforesaid
has been delivered to the master of the ship,
but a young person in whose case any such
authorisation is given shall not be employed
beyond the first port at which the ship calls
after the young person has embarked thereon,
except subject to and in accordance with the
foregoing provisions of this section.