ABSTRACT
British foreign policy in the field of labour conditions is almost entirely associated with its membership of the International Labour Organisation of the League of Nations. Its essential purpose is to improve conditions of labour by international agreement, particularly by securing the removal of injustice, hardship, and privation. The unratified conventions as a whole are somewhat more specific than the ratified conventions, some of which establish general principles rather than particularised obligations. The most famous of the conventions is the Washington Hours Convention which, with certain exceptions, provides for an eight-hour day and a forty-eight hour week in industrial undertakings. The Childbirth Convention provides that a woman worker shall have the right to leave her work six weeks before and shall not be permitted to work during the six weeks following her confinement. This chapter deals with draft conventions which when ratified constitute binding obligations upon the countries, whereas recommendations serve only as a general guide to labour policy.
