employment for which special provision would be likely to be needed if the general scheme were to be along the lines tentatively indicated in paragraphs 27 to 40 below, and comments are invited on this.
15. The DEP would not suggest that such a unified scheme would be applicable to the special conditions in mines and quarries, or that there would be any virtue in disturbing the existing restrictions on young persons' hours in the Mines and Quarries Act, 1954, which are and will continue to be the responsibility of H.M. Inspectors of Mines and Quarries to enforce.
16. On the other hand the DEP is inclined to think that the restrictions on young persons' hours in the Shops Act, 1950, might be replaced by the suggested general scheme of rules. This would involve transferring the central administration of the provisions of that Act relating to conditions of employment from the Home Departments to the DEP - a course which would be acceptable to each Department.
17. As to enforcement of any extended scheme of restrictions there would be obvious advantages in following the proposed pattern of enforcement for the new comprehensive safety, health and welfare legislation which is in preparation. Under this, local authorities would be made responsible for enforcement in respect of "commercial premises" (including offices, shops, places of entertainment, libraries, clubs, hotels, kitchens, restaurants, holiday camps and similar premises) whilst the central inspectorate would be responsible for enforcement in "industrial premises", Crown premises, and premises where there would otherwise be self-inspection by local authorities. Subject to the recommendations of the Royal Commissions on Local Government and the decisions of the Government to implement them, the intention is to define "local authority", for the purpose of enforcing the general provisions of the new safety, health and welfare legislation, in similar terms to those. used in Section 90 of the Offices, Shops and Railway Premises Act, 1963 (as amended by Section 51 of the London Government Act 1963), to mean, in England and Wales, the council of a county borough, a London borough, or a county district, or the Common Council of the City of London and, as respects Scotland, the council of a county, or the town council of a burgh.
SOME SUGGESTIONS FOR SIMPLIFYING THE RESTRICTIONS ON HOURS OF WORK OF YOUNG PERSONS
Working Party's View
18. The working party agreed that restrictions on the hours of young persons in factories were still needed, but disagreed in detail as to what the future restrictions should be. The pattern proposed by the TUC representatives was considerably more restrictive than that proposed by the employers' side.
Special Exemption Orders
19. The DEP sees the possibility of a new approach to the area of disagreement indicated in the foregoing paragraph. Underlying the views expressed was an assumption indeed it was so recommended that the DEP's power to make
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special exemption orders exempting individual establishments or groups of workers from the restrictions would continue. The DEP is now inclined to suggest that the time may have come to surrender this power.
20.
This suggestion has nothing to do with the power to make general exemption regulations, which as intimated in paragraph 14 above would have to be continued so as to allow for types of employment which the general scheme of restrictions would not fit. What the suggestion refers to is the power to
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