ABSTRACT
In reviewing the problem of women’s occupational ill-health in this period, it has been suggested that because factory legislation was the major form of intervention to limit the worst effects of working conditions, this resulted in a narrow perspective on the possible problems women workers confronted. Factory legislation as applied to industrial work and women workers did not encompass all areas of factory work: its applicability addressed only a few specific issues. Thus some aspects, such as heavy lifting or the provision of appropriate lighting, remained outside regulation until very late in the period. Similarly, there was no regulation of workshops until 1895. The control of conditions in domestic outwork or homework happened even later. The omission of certain categories of industrial employment, however, is relatively minor compared with other areas of working and middle-class women’s employment that were excluded, in particular domestic service and service industries such as shop-work, bars and catering although the latter two were subject to some enquiry and intervention.
