Report addressed to Her Majesty's Principal Secretary of State for the Home Department, relative to the grievances complained of by the journeymen bakers : with appendix of evidence / presented to both Houses of Parliament by command of Her Majesty.

Date:
1862
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Report addressed to Her Majesty's Principal Secretary of State for the Home Department, relative to the grievances complained of by the journeymen bakers : with appendix of evidence / presented to both Houses of Parliament by command of Her Majesty. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

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    that tlie assize was set on wheat and not on flour. It was stated by Mr. Edward Grose Smith, clerk to the Bakers’ Company, before the Committee of 1815, that wheat not fit for mealing, but only to be made into starch, or paste for bookbinders or papering rooms, or for biscuits, was brought into the averages in the country. “ The wheat table (price of wheat) never was considered “ by the London bakers of any account, either by the “ Lord Mayor or by the trade,—only the flour table” (Mr. G. F. Turner, Esq., before the Committee of 1815). It was also shown before that Committee (p. 8) that the London bakers took their flour from the millers at the price they chose to set upon it, as, whatever price was set upon it, it was returned to them in the price of the loaf as set by the assize, on the weekly return of the bakers upon the flour used. Some bakers returned the full credit price, although they subsequently obtained a discount for prompt payment. Much flour was returned at a higher price than that at which it was purchased, and much low- priced flour was omitted (pp. 8 and 9). “ Mealmen and “ millers looked to the assize, and raised the price of flour. “ The bakers had no interest in cheap flour; they did not “ care what the price was, and gave it no care in their “ purchases.” (Mr. Wm. Hill, baker, Bishopsgate Street, evidence before Committee of 1821.) Both the bakers and the public were dissatisfied with the operation of the assize laws. As regards the bakers, the Committee of the House of Commons of 1821 reported that the assize acts “ were “ instruments of oppression against the fair tradesman, by “ the power given to informers of seizing bread and of keep- “ ing it three days before he could be compelled to have it “ weighed ” before a magistrate. They rendered him there- fore liable to information and conviction t: on account of “ the necessary waste of the article,” and also “ on “ account of the bread being accidentally under weight by' being burnt in baking.” The Act 55 Geo. III., for the protection of the baker on those points, “ was found in- ££ sufficient,” and he was frequently “driven to bribe, “ common informers.” The public were dissatisfied, because they thought, and rightly, that the price of bread, instead of being kept at, a fair and equitable rate by the assize, was unduly raised by it. After various changes in the weight of bread, which the baker was required to give per quarter of wheat (or sack,