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THE FIRST CHILD LABOUR LAW IN HONG KONG
CARL T. SMITH
A Reminiscence
When I first came to Hong Kong about twenty-eight years ago, I observed cases of open and of hidden child labour,
In certain Chinese tea houses, young girls and boys carried the trays of dim-sum by means of a strap passed around their necks. One could see these children, who seemed only ten or eleven years of age; they may have been a little older, with arched backs to counter-balance the weight of the trays which they carried in front of them. Usually, they were wearily dragging themselves past the tables, but at other times chattering merrily among themselves, but too often one could see the strain of their job on their faces and bodies.
The hidden and less obvious use of children as labourers, I would see in the building I lived in at Tai Po in the New Territories. At that time, it was the tallest building there - a six-storey walk-up. I lived on the top floor. As I climbed the stairs, I passed a flat used as a workshop for sewing sequins on cloth. The room was filled with children, many of whom appeared to be no more than ten or twelve.
Child Labour and the Mui-tsai Question
Agitation about children in domestic service, that is, the mui-tsai system, or, as it was called by some, child slavery, and a movement for regulation of the labour of children outside the home arose about the same time, but each problem had its own history and its own development.
Both problems were initially brought to the attention of the general community by expatriates. In the case of child labour, a law was passed largely in response to pressure from the European community. As for the mui-tsai, though it was a British Naval officer and his wife who began the agitation, a portion of the Chinese community soon took over the campaign for its abolition.