Second Shetland Truck System ReportGuthrie, William
History
Second Shetland Truck System Report
Guthrie, William
Labor law -- Truck system -- History -- England; Shetland (Scotland) -- History
2381. You say that you have about 80 or 100 women engaged
knitting to you?-I only guessed that. I think there must be more.
2382. Is the system of dealing with the whole of these, that an
account is kept?-Yes.
2383. Is that account kept in a pass-book with the knitter?-Not
always. When they want a pass-book, they get it. You can see
from that book [producing work-book], who have pass-books and
who have not.
2384. Has every knitter a separate page in your work-ledger?-
Yes; the book speaks for itself.
2385. It may be convenient for both of us if you take the case of
Jemima Sandison just now, whose passbook I have got here. Is
that pass-book an exact copy of the page in her name in your
ledger?-Yes; the entries in both are made, at the same time. She
brings the pass-book when she wants any article and the entry is
made in the work-book at the same time as in the [Page 50]
pass-book. Unless there is any error in summation or date, the
one should be an exact transcript of the other.
2386. Is it generally known by you or your shopkeeper whether
there is a sum at the credit of the worker, or whether the account
stands the other way?-After they have gone on for a while, and
when they come in with any work, of course we square up the
books and examine them.
2387. In adding up Jemima Sandison's book, I find from
November 11, 1870, to December 28, 1871, the amount of goods
and cash supplied to her was £3, 5s. 3d.?-Yes; but there is
something I may explain with regard to this particular case. All
the work she has done does not appear here. If she wants to get
wool or any other article, she can get it out of the shop on bringing
goods for it, and that does not appear in the book. She sells the
goods to us when she has made them, and gets either cash or goods
for them according she wishes. That book does not show all our
transactions with her.
2388. Some of them may be ready-money transactions?-Not
ready-money, but private transactions, that do not appear in the
books at all, because the book only contains the goods she gets
from us, and for which she returns knitted work. She is paid for
the knitting of these goods, and not for the whole value.
2389. How do you distinguish, in that case, between the goods that
go into the pass-book and those which she gets, but which do not
enter the pass-book?-There is no occasion to distinguish between
them at all, because they are separate transactions.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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