This Glasgow author, Mr Cleland by name, had been describing the means which had been taken by the Governments of George II. and George III. to regulate the price of bread in accordance with price of wheat. His description is very interesting, if only for the fact that it shows that steps had to be taken to regulate the exactions of the profiteer, even in those early days. It shows, also, that the methods of our various “Controllers,” “Food Committees,” etc., are not new, but are very much along the same lines as those devised to keep down the price of bread a century and a half ago. The price of bread was regulated in accordance with the price of wheat, and the baker was allowed a fixed sum per sack of flour for his expenses of baking and distributing.
In the various cities and towns the application of this Act was in the hands of the magistrates; and, in Glasgow, bread prices were fixed at various intervals until 1800, when it was decided at the last Bread Court held to cease the practice, as, in the opinion of the magistrates, such a course was unnecessary; but the weight of loaves continued to be standardised at 4 lbs. 5 oz. 8 drams for the quartern loaf, and 2 lbs. 2 oz. 12 drams for the half-quartern loaf. In view of the price of bread to-day, it is interesting to note that the price of the half-quartern loaf was fixed by the last Glasgow Assize, held in 1800, at 10d. for fine wheaten bread and 7½d. for household bread, which was evidently of a much coarser and poorer quality.
Some of the Bread Assize regulations were peculiar. For instance, the baker had to produce eighty loaves from the sack of flour, and sell these eighty loaves at the exact price which they cost him, in accordance with the cost of flour. “As, however,” says Mr Cleland, “they usually were able to get two loaves more from the sack, and these two loaves were clear profit, the price at which they were sold was a consideration.” At the beginning of the nineteenth century the expenses per sack allowed to the bakers were 14/, but by 1816 this sum had been increased to 16/9.
It was within the right of any two bakers to call the attention of the magistrates to the fact that the price of bread or flour had risen or fallen, and to offer proof. When this was done the magistrates or Justices of the Peace were obliged to take evidence as to the current prices, and, if they found any variation from the last price fixed, “they shall immediately set a new price, which shall remain unaltered until a new Assize has been held.” One wonders whether the magistrates of those days were as difficult to convince that any alteration was necessary as have been the Food Control officials during the last year of the war.
“In 1801 no Assize was held, and it was left to the bakers to sell bread at such price as they could afford.” It is probable that in the results of this decision the reason for the starting of Co-operative societies is to be found, for human nature and the practices of the times being what they were, we may be sure that the bakers saw to it that, however much their profits might increase, they did not go down at all.
Mr Cleland goes on to say:—
“During the last fifteen years, when no Assize has been fixed in Glasgow, the bakers have uniformly proportioned the price of bread to the price of wheat, similarly to what it would have been had the Assize been sitting. There are instances, however, of individual bakers selling their bread somewhat lower than the general run of the trade; and baking societies have been established in the suburbs who uniformly sell their bread one penny, twopence, and sometimes even threepence on the quartern loaf lower than the bakers’ price. These societies do not sell their bread to anyone but their own members; they give no credit and receive neither profit from the concern nor interest on their capital; besides, the members are subjected to the risk of loss incident to the breach of trust in their servants. The greater part of these societies make no household or coarse bread, and no loaf less than quartern; by which arrangement it is evident the lower classes are excluded, as they neither can advance their share of capital nor at all times purchase a quartern loaf. Moreover, the bakeries belonging to these societies being all situated outside the royalty, the flour is exempt from ‘multures,’ a tax to which the flour baked within the royalty is subject, amounting to one eighty-fourth of the whole. As the Assize laws wisely determined (for the sake of the lower classes of the people) that bread shall be baked from a peck loaf down to a quarter-quartern loaf, in exact proportion, and that the twopenny and penny loaves shall be of a weight exactly corresponding to the price of the quartern loaf, it is evident that the person who manufactured the small and the coarse bread, from which the labouring classes of the community are generally supplied, all bearing the same proportion to the wheaten quartern loaf, cannot sell so cheap as the societies; among other reasons because the additional labour is very considerable, and in weighing out the aliquot parts, unless some allowance is made in the dough, the small bread will be deficient in weight when it comes out of the oven; besides, the regular baker must support his family, pay his business, and pay local taxes; he has also to run the risk attending credit, and frequently to give one penny to the shilling discount to chandlers who retail his bread.”
The above is the sum of our knowledge of these early Glasgow baking societies, but the fact that they were able to sell their bread a penny to threepence per quartern loaf below the prices charged by the private bakers, at a time when the quartern loaf cost 1/8 and 1/3, is significant. It meant that the baker was getting from 6/8 to 20/ per sack of flour over the cost of production of the societies, and that, therefore, the cost to the consumer was extortionate. Doubtless, also, the conditions which led to the formation of Co-operative societies in Glasgow prevailed elsewhere, and it is quite likely that baking societies existed at that early date in other parts of Scotland, had their day, and passed out of existence without a trace remaining. Even of those of the existence of which we do know particulars are absent; in most cases the name alone remains, and often not even that but only a tradition.
STIRLINGSHIRE AND HILLFOOTS SOCIETIES.
Early in the nineteenth century Co-operation found a home in Stirlingshire. In the thirtieth year of the century the Bannockburn Co-operative Society came into being as the result of a lecture on “Co-operation,” which was given by Mr William Buchanan, a resident medical man. So impressed were members of his audience with what they had heard that a committee was formed immediately to draft rules and take the steps necessary for the formation of a society. The rules were agreed to at a meeting which was held on 27th November 1830. Bannockburn Society still exists and flourishes to-day, after an unbroken career of eighty-nine years.