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THE INTERNATIONAL LABOR CONFERENCE OF THE LEAGUE OF NATIONS

DRAFT CONVENTION LIMITING THE HOURS OF WORK IN INDUSTRIAL UNDERTAKINGS TO EIGHT IN THE DAY AND FORTY-EIGHT IN THE WEEK1

The General Conference of the International Labor Organization of the League of Nations,

Having been convened at Washington by the Government of the United States of America, on the 29th day of October, 1919, and

Having decided upon the adoption of certain proposals with regard to the "application of principle of the 8-hours day or the 48-hours week," which is the first item in the agenda for the Washington meeting of the Conference, and

Having determined that these proposals shall take the form of a draft international convention,

Adopts the following Draft Convention for ratification by the Members of the International Labor Organization, in accordance with the Labor Part of the Treaty of Versailles of 28 June, 1919, and of the Treaty of St. Germain of 10 September, 1919:

ARTICLE I

For the purpose of this Convention, the term "industrial undertaking" includes particularly:

(a) Mines, quarries, and other works for the extraction of minerals from the earth.

(b) Industries in which articles are manufactured, altered, cleaned, repaired, ornamented, finished, adapted for sale, broken

'The official report of the Draft Conventions and Recommendations adopted by the International Labor Conference of the League of Nations, Washington, D. C., October 29 to November 29, 1919.

up or demolished, or in which materials are transformed; including shipbuilding and the generation, transformation, and transmission of electricity or motive power of any kind.

(c) Construction, reconstruction, maintenance, repair, alteration, or demolition of any building, railway, tramway, harbor, dock, pier, canal, inland waterway, road, tunnel, bridge, viaduct, sewer, drain, well, telegraphic or telephonic installation, electrical undertaking, gas work, water work or other work of construction, as well as the preparation for or laying the foundations of any such work or structure.

(d) Transport of passengers, or goods, by road, rail, sea or inland waterway, including the handling of goods at docks, quays, wharves or warehouses, but excluding transport by hand.

The provisions relative to transport by sea and on inland waterways shall be determined by a special conference dealing with employment at sea and on inland waterways.

The competent authority in each country shall define the line of division which separates industry from commerce and agriculture.

ARTICLE 2

The working hours of persons employed in any public or private industrial undertaking or in any branch thereof, other than an undertaking in which only members of the same family are employed, shall not exceed eight in the day and forty-eight in the week, with the exceptions hereinafter provided for.

(a) The provisions of this Convention shall not apply to persons holding positions of supervision or management, nor to persons employed in a confidential capacity.

(b) Where by law, custom, or agreement between employers' and workers' organizations, or, where no such organizations exist between employers' and workers' representatives, the hours of work on one or more days of the week are less than eight, the limit of eight hours may be exceeded on the remaining days of the week by the sanction of the competent public authority, or by agreement between such organizations or representatives; provided, however, that in no case under the provisions of this paragraph shall the daily limit of eight hours be exceeded by more than one hour.

(c) Where persons are employed in shifts it shall be permissible to employ persons in excess of eight hours in any one day and

forty-eight hours in any one week, if the average number of hours over a period of three weeks or less does not exceed eight per day and forty-eight per week.

ARTICLE 3

The limit of hours of work prescribed in Article 2 may be exceeded in case of accident, actual or threatened, or in case of urgent work to be done to machinery or plant, or in case of force majeure, but only so far as may be necessary to avoid serious interference with the ordinary working of the undertaking.

ARTICLE 4

The limit of hours of work prescribed in Article 2 may also be exceeded in those processes which are required by reason of the nature of the process to be carried on continuously by a succession of shifts, subject to the condition that the working hours shall not exceed fifty-six in the week on the average. Such regulation of the hours of work shall in no case affect any rest days which may be secured by the national law to the workers in such processes in compensation for the weekly rest day.

ARTICLE 5

In exceptional cases where it is recognized that the provisions of Article 2 can not be applied, but only in such cases, agreements between workers' and employers' organizations concerning the daily limit of work over a longer period of time, may be given the force of regulations, if the Government, to which these agreements shall be submitted, so decides. The average number of hours worked per week, over the number of weeks covered by any such agreement, shall not exceed forty-eight.

ARTICLE 6

Regulations made by public authority shall determine for industrial undertakings:

(a) The permanent exceptions that may be allowed in preparatory or complementary work which must necessarily be carried on outside the limits laid down for the general working of an establishment, or for certain classes of workers whose work is essentially intermittent.

(b) The temporary exceptions that may be allowed, so that establishments may deal with exceptional cases of pressure of work.

These regulations shall be made only after consultation with the organizations of employers and workers concerned, if any such organizations exist. These regulations shall fix the maximum of additional hours in each instance, and the rate of pay for overtime shall not be less than one and one-quarter times the regular rate.

ARTICLE 7

Each Government shall communicate to the International Labor Office:

(a) A list of the processes which are classed as being necessarily continuous in character under Article 4;

(b) Full information as to working of the agreements mentioned in Article 5; and

(c) Full information concerning the regulations made under Article 6 and their application.

The International Labor Office shall make an annual report thereon to the General Conference of the International Labor Organization.

ARTICLE 8

In order to facilitate the enforcement of the provisions of this Convention, every employer shall be required:

(a) To notify by means of the posting of notices in conspicuous places in the works or other suitable place, or by such other method as may be approved by the Government, the hours at which work begins and ends, and where work is carried on by shifts the hours at which each shift begins and ends. These hours shall be so fixed that the duration of the work shall not exceed the limits prescribed by this Convention, and when so notified they shall not be changed except with such notice and in such manner as may be approved by the Government.

(b) To notify in the same way such rest intervals accorded during the period of work as are not reckoned as part of the working hours.

(c) To keep a record in the form prescribed by law or regulation in each country of all additional hours worked in pursuance of Articles 3 and 6 of this Convention.

It shall be made an offense against the law to employ any person outside the hours fixed in accordance with paragraph (a), or during the intervals fixed in accordance with paragraph (b).

ARTICLE 9

In the application of this Convention to Japan the following modifications and conditions shall obtain:

(a) The term "industrial undertaking" includes particularly--The undertakings enumerated in paragraph (a) of Article 1;

The undertakings enumerated in paragraph (b) of Article I, provided there are at least ten workers employed;

The undertakings enumerated in paragraph (c) of Article I, in so far as these undertakings shall be defined as "factories" by the competent authority;

The undertakings enumerated in paragraph (d) of Article 1, except transport of passengers or goods by road, handling of goods at docks, quays, wharves, and warehouses, and transport by hand; and

Regardless of the number of persons employed, such of the undertakings enumerated in paragraphs (b) and (c) of Article I as may be declared by the competent authority either to be highly dangerous or to involve unhealthy processes.

(b) The actual working hours of persons of fifteen years of age or over in any public or private industrial undertaking, or in any branch thereof, shall not exceed fifty-seven in the week, except that in the raw-silk industry the limit may be sixty hours in the week.

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(c) The actual working hours of persons under fifteen years of age any public or private industrial undertaking, or in any branch thereof, and of all miners of whatever age engaged in underground work in the mines, shall in no case exceed forty-eight in the week.

(d) The limit of hours of work may be modified under the conditions provided for in Articles 2, 3, 4, and 5 of this Convention, but in no case shall the length of such modification bear to the length of the basic week a proportion greater than that which obtains in those Articles.

(e) A weekly rest period of twenty-four consecutive hours shall be allowed to all classes of workers.