Decline of Turnpikes 313 



Review " for October, 1825, it is said : " Statute labour on the 

 parish roads is limited to six days work and on the turnpikes 

 to three. But it is now found generally expedient to demand 

 or take money in lieu of labour, according to a rate to be fixed 

 by the justices in different places. ... In practice the 

 statute labour was frequently a farce, half of the time being 

 spent in going and returning and in conversation and idle- 

 ness." 



An authority referred to in Postlethwayt's " Dictionary " 

 (1745) had suggested that criminals condemned to death for 

 minor offences should, instead of being transported, be ordered 

 to do a year's work on the highway. He further recommended, 

 in all seriousness, that arrangements should be made with the 

 African Company for the importation of 200 negroes as road- 

 repairers, they being, as he said, " generally persons to do a 

 great deal of work." Failing criminals and negroes, some of 

 the parishes did employ paupers, gangs of whom were to be 

 seen pretending to work at road-mending, and getting far 

 more degeneration for themselves than they did good for the 

 roads. 



In 1835 Parliament abolished both statute labour and 

 statute labour composition, thenceforward wholly superseded 

 by highway rates as applying to the whole of the minor roads 

 for which the parish was responsible. 



Bad as the statute labour system had been, its abolition 

 involved a loss to the turnpike trusts estimated at about 

 200,000 a year ; and this was a serious matter to trustees 

 whose financial position was becoming hopeless in view 

 of their liabilities and the discouraging nature of their outlook. 

 Such discouragement was due in great part to the advent of 

 the railways, but not entirely so, the Select Committee of 

 1839 on Turnpike Trusts saying in their report that " the 

 gradual decline in the transit on turnpike roads in some parts of 

 the country arises not only from the railways formed but from 

 steam vessels plying on rivers and as coasting traders " ; 

 and they added : " Whenever mechanical power has been 

 substituted for animal power, the result has hitherto been that 

 the labour is performed at a cheaper rate." 



The cost of making and repairing turnpike roads, especially 

 under the primitive conditions still widely retained, not- 

 withstanding the improved methods introduced by Telford 



