I move the Second Reading of the Shop Hours (Barbers and Hairdressers, Dublin and Districts) Bill, 1925. I do not think there will be so much controversy about this measure.
SHOP HOURS (BARBERS AND HAIRDRESSERS, DUBLIN AND DISTRICTS) BILL, 1925.
SECOND STAGE.
CATHAOIRLEACH
There might be more hair flying.
The object of this Bill is compulsorily to close barbers and hairdressers' shops in the city and townships surrounding Dublin. I have been approached by the Secretary of the Dublin Masters' Guild, or the Employers' Association of Hairdressers, in connection with this matter. I was also approached by the Secretary of the Journeymen's Trade Union. They requested me to take this matter in hands with a view to getting the Oireachtas to give legal effect to the agreement arrived at as far back as 1920 between the employers and the operatives in this industry. For a considerable number of years—20 years—there has been an agitation in the city directed towards the closing of hairdressers' shops on a Sunday, with a view to enabling the people employed there to observe the Sunday as Christians should observe it, without doing any servile work. After twenty years' agitation between the employers and the workmen they came to an agreement to close compulsorily on Sundays in Dublin and the townships the shops in this particular line of business. I am informed that there are not at the moment a half dozen shops in the whole of the city and county of Dublin that open on Sunday mornings. It was with the object of preventing this and preventing these people from revoking the agreement arrived at that this Bill has been brought in. I may say that whatever justification there may have been years ago for opening these shops on Sundays, there is no justification now. The advent of the safety razor has made it possible for every man to shave himself without compelling another man to open his shop on Sunday morning and shave him. But there is an added reason why I think they should not be opened. In recent years a considerable number of the fair sex have been patronising the barbers' shops, getting their hair bobbed and shingled. I do suggest that it would not be a nice thing on a Sunday morning to see the young ladies lined up and waiting outside a barber's shop instead of going to church. We always hear a good deal of talk about harmony and the need for having harmoney between the employers and their workmen. Now a state of harmony has been arrived at between the employers and their workmen in this industry, and they ask you by passing this Bill to give legal effect to this agreement and put an end to what was nothing but an abuse. I therefore, with much pleasure, move the Second Reading of the Bill.
Question put.
Has the motion been seconded?
CATHAOIRLEACH
I think it is one of the matters that is expressly precluded from the necessity of being seconded. On looking into it, I find that the motion proposed by the Senator is a little irregular, because this being a public Bill moved by a private Senator, notice of intention to move the Second Reading should have been given. By Standing Order 56, when a Bill has passed its First Stage and has been circulated, notice of motion should be given for the Second Reading. That, I think, has not been given. I do not know whether any Senator is going to take notice of that——
I certainly do take notice of it, because notice of the Second Reading of the Bill has not been given to me.
CATHAOIRLEACH
If there is any objection, I cannot allow Senator Farren to move the Bill to-day. The Senator had better give notice of motion to-day for the day on which he will move it.
I will see to that. I hope when it comes on next time that there will be no necessity for my making a second speech on it.