Agricultural Wages Act 1948

12 Officers

(1) The Minister may, subject to the consent of the Treasury as to number, appoint such officers as he thinks necessary for the purpose of investigating complaints and otherwise securing the proper observance of this Act.

(2) Every officer appointed under this section shall be furnished by the Minister with a certificate of his employment, and when acting under or exercising any power conferred upon him by this Act shall, if so required, produce the certificate to any person or persons affected.

(3) An officer so appointed shall have power—

(a) after giving reasonable notice, to require the production of and to inspect and take copies of wages sheets or other records of wages paid to workers employed in agriculture ;

(b) to enter at all reasonable times any premises or place for the purpose of such inspection or for the enforcement of this Act, but in the case of a dwelling-house not without giving reasonable notice ; and

(c) to require any such worker, or the employer of any such worker, or any agent of the employer, to give any information which it is in his power to give with respect to the employment of the worker or the wages paid to him.

(4) An officer so appointed shall have power, in pursuance of any special or general directions of the Minister, to take proceedings in respect of offences against this Act and may, although not a barrister or solicitor, prosecute or conduct before a court of summary jurisdiction any proceedings arising under this Act.

(5) Where it appears to an officer so appointed—

(a) that a sum is due from an employer to a worker on account of the payment of wages to him at less than the minimum rate applicable or by reason of a direction given under subsection (1) of section eight of this Act by an agricultural wages committee for the payment of an additional sum by way of wages for piece work ; or

(b) that a sum is due from an employer on account of the receipt of a premium in contravention of subsection (5) of section six of this Act ;

the officer (if he is authorised in that behalf by special or general directions of the Minister) may institute, on behalf of or in the name of the worker, civil proceedings before any competent court of jurisdiction for the recovery of the sum in question, and in any such civil proceedings instituted by the officer the court shall, if the officer is not a party to the proceedings, have the same power to make an order for the payment of costs by the officer as if he were a party to the proceedings.

(6) Nothing in the last preceding subsection shall be taken to exclude the bringing otherwise than in accordance with that subsection of proceedings for the recovery of any such gum as is therein mentioned.

(7) If any person—

(a) hinders or molests an officer acting in the exercise of his powers under subsection (3) of this section ; or

(b) refuses to produce any document or give any information which an officer so acting lawfully requires him to produce or give ; or

(c) produces or causes to be produced or knowingly allows to be produced to an officer so acting any wages sheet, record or other document which is false in a material particular, knowing the document to be false ; or

(d) furnishes to an officer so acting any information knowing it to be false,

he shall be liable on summary conviction to a fine not exceeding twenty pounds or to imprisonment for a term not exceeding three months, or to both such fine and such imprisonment.