The First Labour Laws.

New Zealand Graphic, Volume XLVIII, Issue 4, 24 July 1912, Page 35

The First Labour Laws.

The first attempt to regulate wages by law was made in the reign of Richard 11. It was a statute framed for the employers, as this excuse for it shows. For so runs the preamble:—“Servants ami labourers will not, nor by a long season would, serve and labour without outrageous and excessive hire, and much more hath been given to such servants and labourers than in any time past, so that tor scarcity of the said labourers the husband and the land tenants may not pay their rents, to the great damage ami loss as well of their lords as of all the commons; also the hires of the said servants in husbandry have not been put in certainty before this time.” The Act, then, defined the “hires” and promised punishment to all masters who paid higher rates than those laid down. Tlie principle stood for several reigns, the rates only being revised. The statute of Henry \ 11., for instance, was a Minimum Wage Bill with “.safeguards." For

sanction was given for deductions to be made for the “slacking” of the worker. The rates were fixed with an eye to the wages current in the districts, and then the worker was kept well up to the mark. He was paid less at holiday times, for instance, and, should he chance to move slowly in the mornings, or linger - over his meals, his money could lie clipped at his master's discretion.