Report No. 62
10.15. Importance of Agricultural employment.-
Finally, we would like to re-emphasise the importance of agricultural employment. Writing in 1969, the National Commission on Labour1 noted as follows:-
"Agricultural labour excluding small cultivators, according to the Census, accounts for 30.6 millions. Agriculture in its broad connotation accounts for nearly 50 per cent. of our national income and engages about 70 per cent. of the working population."
The same Commission noted2 that agricultural labour is mostly provided by economically and socially backward classes. These figures and facts bring out the magnitude of this occupation of employment in agriculture. It is also well-known that mechanisation is on the increase in agriculture as in other walks of life.
1. National Commission on Labour Report, (1969), p. 394, para. 28.6.
2. National Commission on Labour Report, (1969), p. 393, para. 28.4.
10.16. We would also like to quote what was stated in a recent study1 dealing with personal injuries-
"The rate at which social institutions and ideas are being turned upside down is not merely dramatic-it is accelerating every year in a fashion which demands a great deal of mental energy to keep pace. It cannot be good enough, therefore, to adjust merely to the contemporary needs. Some deliberate attention should be given to the foreseeable demands of the years immediately ahead. And if there may seem to be a weight of tradition against change, at least it is worth remembering that the apparent heresies of one generation become the orthodoxies of the next. The ultimate validity of any social measure will depend not upon its antecedents, but upon its current and future utility."
1. Woodhouse Commission-Report on Compensation for Personal Injury (New Zealand) (1969), para. 33, cited in note on Compensation for Personal Injury, (1969), 20 I.C.L.Q. 191, 196.
10.17. Desirability of amendment.-
There is, therefore, considerable justification for widening the scope of the Act on the subject mentioned above.
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