View report page

121
Workmen's Baths. A letter has been received from the
National Women's Labour League with reference to Industrial
Dirt, and asking that the Municipality should set an
example in relation to its employees of making provision for
personal cleanliness. A pamphlet has also been forwarded
showing what is done both in England and abroad in this
matter. Everyone appreciates the desirability of personal
cleanliness and a daily bath is specially important for men
engaged in dirty occupations such as scavenging, dust destructors,
etc. Public baths have been a great boon to a
large number of people but in the ease of the great majority
of workmen the distance from the home, the cost and the
time occupied, prevent their frequent use. At certain industrial
works in England, and to a much larger extent in
certain continental cities, and the United States, employers of
labour have either in their own interests or in that of their
employees made very elaborate provision for the workmen
to wash themselves before leaving their "work. The pamphlet
referred to says:—
"In the better towns in the United States and Canada
the democratic self-respect of the people makes the use of
working overalls, and the provision of full cleansing
opportunities at the works, all but universal. Citizens of
New York over in this country express amazement at our
national toleration of the grimy condition of many of the
passengers on our tramcars and trains. Their own dustmen,
road sweepers, etc., are provided daily with a clean
white suit of overalls, and look their part of servants of
the Public Health as attractively as our hospital nurses.
By all accounts too, the increased self-respect engendered
by the uniform reacts most beneficially upon the standard
of the cleansing work performed."