Truck Acts

Truck Acts is the name given to legislation that outlaws truck systems, which are also known as "company store" systems, commonly leading to debt bondage. In England such laws date back to the 15th century. They have also been implemented in other countries.

The modern successor of the Truck Acts is found in the Employment Rights Act 1996 sections 13-27. This replaced and updated the Wages Act 1986 which had itself repealed the Truck Acts. A case called Bristow v City Petroleum was the last case to be decided under the old legislation and in it, Lord Ackner in the House of Lords gave a short history of the previous regime.

The old Truck enactments were very numerous and date from about the year 1464. The particular evil intended to be remedied was the truck system, or payment by masters of their men's wages wholly or in part with goods – a system open to various abuse – when workmen were forced to take goods at their master's valuation. The statutes were applied first to one branch of manufacture, and then in succession to others, as experience and the progress of manufactures dictated, until they embraced the whole or nearly the whole of the manufactures of England. They established the obligation, and produced, or at least fortified the custom, of uniformly paying the whole wages of artificers in the current coin of the realm.

In Great Britain and (after 1801) the United Kingdom, a series of Acts of Parliament have been enacted to make truck systems unlawful:

The Truck Acts 1831 to 1896 means the Truck Act 1896 and the Truck Acts 1831 and 1887.

The Truck Acts 1831 to 1940 means the Truck Act 1940 and the Truck Acts 1831 to 1896.

The rise of manufacturing industry saw many company owners cashing in on their workers by paying them in full or in part with tokens, rather than coin of the realm. These tokens were exchangeable for goods at the company store, often at highly inflated prices. The Truck Act 1831 made this practice illegal in many trades, and the law was extended to cover nearly all manual workers in 1887.

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