Note 20 — Chapter III · SHOP ASSISTANTS, CLERKS, WAITRESSES

A peculiarly shocking example of the abuses that may arise from a system of fining was lately brought to my knowledge. It is not recent, and must, I think and hope, be unique. I have found no witness who has ever heard of a similar instance. Of its truth, however, the source from which it comes forbids doubt. These are the facts. In a certain retail shop selling drapery and fancy goods the foreman, whose business it apparently was to collect fines, was required to make up a fixed sum of money from this source every week; and being a man with wife and children, afraid above all things of being left without employment, was accustomed to inflict sufficient fines to make up this total. Two girls, whose weekly wage of 11s. he had thus reduced, on one occasion, to 4s., took to evil courses; and the foreman when dying (in a hospital) told a lady visitor the circumstances, and said that he felt himself responsible for the downfall of the girls. The lady (an experienced worker in a girls’ club) made enquiries, which confirmed the startling tale. She followed up the girls, reclaimed one and put her into respectable employment, but failed with the other and was unable to keep sight of her.