Regulating Health and Safety in the British Mining Industries, 18001914 (Studies in Labour History)

This book explores the emergence and growth of state responsibility for safer and healthier working practices in British mining and the responses of labour and industry to expanding regulation and control. It begins with an assessment of working practice in the coal and metalliferous mining industries at the dawn of the nineteenth century and the hazards involved for the miners, before charting the rise of reforming interest in these industries. The differing regulation of the coal and metalliferous mining sectors provides a useful model for exploring the role of organized labour in determining the early chronology and nature of reform. Where the colliers grouped together in unions, forming the Miners' Association of Great Britain and Ireland in 1842, the miners in the metalliferous sector valued independence and self-sufficiency. The 1850 Act for the Inspection of Coal Mines in Great Britain led to tighter legislation in coal mining, yet the metalliferous miners continued to work without government-regulated safety regulation into the twentieth century. The author explores the reasons for this, taking into account socio-economic, environmental, medical, technical, and cultural concerns. As an investigation into the formation of health and safety legislation in a major industry, this work will be valuable to all those with an interest in medical history, occupational health, legal history, and the social history of work in the nineteenth century.