APlea for Poor Law Reform.* 


THE Poor Law was established to relieve and diminish poverty. It 
was the most humane of our institutions in its origin: in its administration 
it is so harsh and humiliating that most self-respectin CT 
workers prefer prolonged starvation, and many death, to accepting 
the relief it offers. The harshness might be justified if our industrial 
system were such as to secure to every reasonably thrifty personthe means of providing for old age and misfortune without the aid of 
the Poor Law. But as a matter of fact, low wa.ges and precariousemployment make it difficult for the laboring class to live even in 
the humblest decency, and utterly impossible for them to save. 

Each day in the year over 940,000 persons in the United Kingdom 
are driven to accept relief as paupers. In the course of every 
year about two millions of separate individuals are thus relieved. 

At least one in five persons over 65 is a pauper. 

In London alone in 1892 there was an average of 58,145 indoor 
and 45,792 outdoor paupers, over 200,000 separate individuals falling 
for longer or shorter periods into this condition in the course of 
the year.

One in every eight of deaths in London takes place in a 
workhouse or other Poor Law institution. 

Poor Law administration, since 1834, has aimed at abolishingpauperism by deliberately increasing the miseries of poverty. Bymaking public relief dishonorable, and disfranchising the receiver, it 
has reduced the number of applicants and relieved the Poor Rate; 
but it has done nothing to root out destitution ; and it has often, in 
saving the ratepayers the expense of relieving a pauper, put uponthem the expense of prosecuting and punishing a prisoner. 

No distinction in treatment is made between the professionalidler and the worker who, through accident, sickness, misfortune, or 
depression of trade, is thrown on the rates. No honor, but deliberate 
dishonor, is assigned to the old age of the poor. No sufficient 
care is taken to ensure that the destitute children of whom the State 
takes charge shall be reared as efficient and self-respecting citizens. 

REFORMS NEEDED. 
I.-Improved Education for Children. 


Over 50,000 children in England alone are in the charge of 
the Poor Law authorities. Their treatment is condemned by the 
fact that many of them grow up to lead pauper lives. They should 
not be taught in workhouse schools, but in the public elementary 

• See also Fabian '£racts Nos. 17 and 20, entitled" Reform of the Poor Law," 
and" Questions for Poor Law Guardians." 

schools; and they should not under any circumstances live in workhouses. 
The present practice of placing them out as mere laborers, 
or as errand boys and domestic drudges, should be abandoned. Theyshould be well started in life by putting them to some skilled trade. 
They must not be made to feel that their dependence is in any waycriminal or disgraceful, and they must therefore not be marked out, 
either by dress or in any other way, from the children of more 
fortunate parents. The children of the State must be made a credit, 
not a disgrace, to its citizens. 

11.-The Humanizing of the Workhouse. 

At present the workhouse is too often made a prison. The agedand infirm within its walls are not allowed to go out except for a 
day or two in each month: they are deprived of their trifling indulgences, 
clothe<1 in a pauper uniform, and made to feel themselves 
not honorable pensioners, but dishonorable burdens upon the community. 
The well-conducted aged poor should be allowed to go out 
on every fine day; they should be clothed in a way not markingthem out as paupers; they should be allowed their tobacco and tea, 
and permitted to occupy themselves in any way not inconvenient to 
their comrades; and aged married couples should have every facility 
for living together as the law at present allows. The veterans of 
Labor should be made in every way to realise that they are enjoyiugthe provision willingly made for them by the community which theyhave served. 

111.-State Pensions for the Aged. 

About 160,000 retired civil servants, military and naval officers 
and men, policemen, postmen and others, receive pensions. In all 
these cases the pension is given from the State as a matter of 
right; and the pensioner enjoys, in addition, whatever he may have 
saved out of his pay. But an ordinary wage-earner who has saved 
a little out of his wages, is not allowed to do this. If he has saved 
less thn,n enough to live ou, he must actually spend all his little 
capital before the Guardians will come to his assistance; for until 
he is absolutely destitute the law refuses him outdoor relief. This 
is a hardship all round : it increases the burden of the rates, and 

mR.kes the laborer feel that it is useless for him to practise the 
"thrift" that is preached to him so freely. Every worker directly 
or indirectly contributes, whilst he works, towards the rates and 
taxes. Every citizen should have the right, when he can work no 
more, to a pension from the State-after the age, say, of 65. 

IV.-Public Aid for the Sick. 

Every sufferer from serious illness should be entitled to free 
treatment in hospital. In London nearly two-thirds of our hospital 
accommodation is maintained from public funds, although the citizens 
have practically no control over 1t and do not even know that 
they contribute to it otherwise than by private voluntary subscription. 
The existing distinction between the so-called voluntary and 


the rate-supported hospitals ought to be abolished, and the whole 

public provision for the sick and insane placed under an elected public 

authority. 
' 

The provision for the sick should be separated entirely from the 

Poor Law administration. 

V.-Reform of the Casual Ward. 

The casual wards have encouraged a class of habitual vagrants,
who make no attempt to better their condition. Habitual casuals 
and demoralised loafers should be sent to a reforming labor colony, 
where they could earn their subsistence by the performance of some 
useful work. Willing workers of good character, when the uncertainty.of employment under our present industrial system forces them to 
resort to the casual ward, should be helped to find employment. 

VI.-Improvement of the Administrative 

Machinery. 

Reform of Poor Law machinery is much needed, especially m 
London. For the election of Guardians an elector has from one to 
six votes, according to his rating. An occupying owner has votes 
both as owner and occupier. Thus one person often has twelve 
votes. The legislative reforms immediately needed are:


1. 
Abolition of plural voting; no person to have more than 
one vote. 
2. 
Disfranchisement on acceptance of Poor Law relief to be 
abolished. 
3. Elections 
to be triennial and by ballot on a combined 
County Council and Parliamentary register.
4. 
Removal of the remaining £5 rating qualification for 
Guardians. 
5. 
Exclusion of the present ex-officio Guardians (Justices of 
the Peace).
The Boards of Guardians should sit at times when workers can 
attend. A Poor Law Council should be elected triennially for the 
whole of London, to have supreme control over all asylums, workhouses, 
and, so long as they are retained, the Poor Law schools. In 
its hands should be the fixing of a Poor Rate for the whole 
metropolis, thus doing away with the present gross inequality 
between rich and poor neighborhoods. 

A Royal Commission is now sitting to enquire into the condition 
of the aged poor. Now is the time to press forward demands for 
reform. 

Befo1•e the election for Guardians comes on, get from the 
Fabian Society the "Questions for Poor Law Guardians," and 
form your judgment of the fitness of the candidates by the 
answers they return. Wherever possible, run Democratic 
candidates. 

The figures in the above are obtained from Local Government Board Reports,
C 6725, p. vi.; C 6745, pp. 378, 376, 380; C 6801, p. 4; and "Pauperism and Old 
AgQ Pensions," by C. Booth, p. 130. 


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