Mistakes of the Local Government Board and of Other Authorities in Poor Law Administration: Being a Memorandum Laid Before the Poor Law Commission (Cl

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Excerpt from Mistakes of the Local Government Board and of Other "Authorities" In Poor Law Administration: Being a Memorandum Laid Before the Poor Law CommissionIN the year 1906 I gave evidence before the Poor Law Commission, which will no doubt be published with their Report. Quite recently, I forwarded to the Commission the following Memorandum, but found that I had sent it too late for publication as part Of their Proceedings. I am therefore publish ing it independently, and am glad to be able to do so before the winter, as it is really essential, both for saving the lives of the Poor and protecting the health of the Nation, that the present Poor Law should be fully and faithfully carried out until better provision for the needs of the Poor and for the health of the Nation is made. The mistake of telling Guardians that their duty is only to relieve the destitute, instead of giving relief to the impotent poor which of course includes the sick poor who need it (see page 2) - is I believe inherited from the Old Poor Law Board, and the result is all the worse because the error is of such long-standing.In consequence Of this deceptive phraseology many Guardians are quite ignorant of their legal duties. Many of the Poor are equally ignorant of the right to relief which the Law gives them. This ignorance on both sides is, I think, one of the causes of the Starvation Deaths in the richest City Of the World 1, and of infinite damage to the Poor all over the kingdom.As to the surcharges for relief (see pp. 3, 4, the Nation has great cause to thank Mr. John Burns and his Auditors for detecting the frauds of a few Guardians, and the great extravagance, Of others in connection wit/z Contracts and Contractors, but the well-meaning Auditors, in their new-born zeal, have done much mischief in making surcharges, and trying to make surcharges, for relief given to the Poor.I wish to call special attention to the words of Sir Matthew Hale, Sir William Blackstone, and Sir George Nicholls (see pp. 2, 6-9, Our English Social System has been placed on ancient and strong foundations. Our English Law has strong claims on the Obedience of the people both rich and poor. It is surely the extreme of folly for the well-to-do classes to allow the foundations to be weakened by defective administration of that Law.About the PublisherForgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.comThis book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully, any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.