per last.per day
When wheat shall be14l.the price of labour shall be1s.2d.
" " "16 " " "1s.4d.
" " "18 " " "1s.6d.
" " "20 " " "1s.8d.
" " "22 " " "1s.10d.
" " "24 " " "2s.0d.
" " "26 " " "2s.2d.
When wheat shall be28l.the price of labour shall be2s.4d.
" " "30 " " "2s.6d.
" " "32 " " "2s.8d.
" " "34 " " "2s.10d.
" " "36 " " "3s.0d.

And so on, according to this proportion.

3rd. That a petition to parliament to regulate the price of labour, conformable to the above plan, be immediately adopted; and that the day labourers throughout the county be invited to associate and co-operate in this necessary application to parliament, as a peaceable, legal, and probable mode of obtaining relief; and, in doing this, no time should be lost, as the petition must be presented before the 29th January, 1796.

4th. That one shilling shall be paid into the hands of the treasurer by every labourer, in order to defray the expenses of advertising, attending on meetings, and paying counsel to support their petition in parliament.

5th. That as soon as the sense of the day labourers of this county, or a majority of them, shall be made known to the clerk of the meeting, a general meeting shall be appointed, in some central town, in order to agree upon the best and easiest mode of getting the petition signed: when it will be requested that one labourer, properly instructed, may be deputed to represent two or three contiguous parishes, and to attend the above intended meeting with a list of all the labourers in the parishes he shall represent, and pay their respective subscriptions; and that the labourer, so deputed, shall be allowed two shillings and sixpence a day for his time, and two shillings and sixpence a day for his expenses.

6th. That Adam Moore, clerk of the meeting, be directed to have the above resolutions, with the names of the farmers and labourers who have subscribed to and approved them, advertised in one Norwich and one London paper; when it is hoped that the above plan of a petition to parliament will not only be approved and immediately adopted by the day labourer of this county, but by the labourers of every county in the kingdom.

7th. That all letters, post paid, addressed to Adam Moore, labourer, at Heacham, near Lynn, Norfolk, will be duly noticed.

[350] Quoted Hammond, The Village Labourer, pp. 137-9.

6. Debates on Whitbread's Minimum Wage Bill [Parliamentary History, Vol. XXXIII, cols. 700-15], 1795-6.

Debate in the Commons on Mr. Whitbread's Bill to regulate the wages of Labourers in Husbandry. December 9. Mr. Whitbread presented to the House a bill "to explain and amend so much of the act of the 5th of Elizabeth, intituled: 'An act containing divers orders for artificers, labourers, servants of husbandry and apprentices,'" as empowers justices of the peace, at, or within six weeks after, every general quarter sessions held at Easter, to regulate the wages of labourers in husbandry. The bill was read a first time. On the motion for the second reading, Mr. Whitbread said, that he had brought forward this bill under the idea that it was possible, by adopting its regulations, to give great relief to a very numerous and useful class of the community. The act of Elizabeth empowered justices of the peace to fix the maximum of labour. This bill went only to empower them to fix the minimum. However the House might decide with respect to his bill, he trusted at least that the act of Elizabeth would be repealed.