THE NEW POOR LAWS. (Hansard, 27 July 1836)

§ Mr. Walter
said, that he had been intrusted with a Petition from Magistrates, Clergy, Owners and occupiers of land, Guardians of the Poor, and inhabitants of the parish of Pet-worth and the neighbouring parishes, in the 591 county of Sussex. The object of the petition was to deprecate the harsh manner in which the new Poor-law was enforced in that important district. The petitioners stated themselves to be all rate-payers, and therefore the money for the humane; relief of the poor must come out of their own pockets. The grievance of which they complained came, perhaps, under but one head, namely, the order recently issued by the Poor-law Commissioners, forbidding any out-door relief whatever to be given to the families of able-bodied labourers: but that grievance was one which passed through every gradation of cruelty—

§ The Speaker
, interrupting the hon. Member, observed, that he should confine himself to a statement of the substance of the petition and the prayer of it. Such was the rule laid down by the House.

§ Mr. Walter
said, that he should be most unwilling to transgress any of the rules or regulations of the House. It struck him, however, that other Gentlemen had been permitted to accompany the petitions they presented with observations in illustration of the statements contained in them.

§ The Speaker
repeated, that the hon. Member should only state the substance of the petition.

§ Mr. Walter
proceeded to say, that the petition stated with truth, that at the time when the present body of industrious labourers with large families first married, the law and practice were, to afford relief in proportion to the number of children they had beyond those whom they could maintain by ordinary labour. In fact, every incitement was at that day held out to industrious labourers to marry. For example, it was said in that House by Mr. Pitt, "Let us make relief, in cases where there are a number of children, a matter of right and an honour, instead of a ground for opprobrium and contempt. This will make a large family a blessing, and not a curse; and this will draw a proper line of distinction between those who are able to provide for themselves by their labour, and those who, after having enriched their country with a number of children, have a claim upon its assistance for their support." And Mr. Whitbread, though opposed to Mr. Pitt in politics, said, "As to the particular case of labourers who have to provide for a number of children, the wisest thing for Government, instead of putting the relief afforded to such on a fooling of charity, supplied perhaps from a precarious 592 find, and dealt with a reluctant hand, would be at once to institute a liberal premium for the encouragement of large families."

§ Mr. John Parker
rose to order. He submitted that the hon. Member had no right to go into these general statements on the presentation of a petition.

§ Mr. Walter
said, that he had only referred to these statements in explanation of what had been the law and the practice on this subject formerly. But now, the law and practice turned round upon these unhappy industrious people, and forbade all relief to them except such as they should receive when immured in the prison of a district workhouse, in which they were to go to bed at this time of the year at eight o'clock in the evening, the husband to be separated from his wife, and the children, except perhaps such as were at the breast severed from their parents. The petitioners had already applied to the Poor-law Commissioners themselves for a relaxation of this atrocious and unnatural order; and, procuring no relaxation of it from them—no relief to the victims of it from them—to whom could they fly but to that House—the representatives, he hoped he might still say, of the poor and the oppressed? In addition to the petition, he had also received a letter from a gentleman of the first respectability in the parish, of which he would read a part, as necessary to the better understanding of the case:— I shrink with horror from the cruelties which are now being practised upon my poor fellow-parishioners, and trust that the most prompt steps will be taken to cause a relaxation in the rules laid down by the Commissioners; being convinced, that if they are adhered to, numbers around me must perish ere the close of the next winter, either by want, or by those fruitless attempts at resistance to which they will be goaded.

§ The Speaker
must again remind the hon. Member, that he was infringing that rule of the House which required that he should only state the substance of the petition and the prayer of it.

§ Major Beauclerk
said, he wished to say one word with regard to the rule in question. He seldom addressed the House, but, nevertheless he was anxious that this rule should be properly understood. He had observed upon late occasions some Gentlemen speaking for two hours together in presenting petitions, and others, on similar occasions, making orations of not less than an hour's duration. Now what he wished 593 to know was, whether it was to be understood, that no gentleman should make a speech on the presentation of a petition, but should limit himself strictly to a statement of the substance and prayer of it. If the rule was to be so understood and so enforced, he was perfectly ready to assent to it; but he must object to the practice of allowing Gentlemen one day to make speeches on petitions, and then on another day preventing hon. Members from speaking at all on a similar occasion.

§ The Speaker
I have endeavoured, as far as it was practicable, to adopt and enforce the rule laid down by the House on the subject. That rule is, that if a petition be presented referring to a subject before the House, the hon. Member presenting it should confine himself to a statement of the substance and prayer of such petition. There is, however, a class of petitions often presented to the House, complaining of individual grievances, and not relating to any general public matter before the House. It is the pleasure of the House, in regard to these petitions, that the hon. Members presenting them should be allowed to go into a statement of the facts and arguments connected with them. As far as I am able, I have endeavoured to enforce the rule in the manner I have stated. The rule has been adopted by the House for the public convenience and for the despatch of business, and it is very important that it should be adhered to in practice.

§ Mr. Walter
said, that he should not have occupied the time of the House for more than five minutes in presenting this petition, if he had been allowed to proceed without interruption. It appeared from the statement contained in this letter, that the Board of Guardians had refused to act; and it would be impossible for him to do justice to the case of the petitioners unless he was allowed to state the circumstances connected with that fact. The hon. Member proceeded to read the letter as follows:— One rule sent down by the Board of Guardians is, that no relief be granted to any able-bodied labourer after the 21st ult., however large his family may be; and the only alternative held out, except starvation, is, that the elder children may be sent to one workhouse— the man and his wife, with the younger children, to another; but then in this other the man and his wife are to be kept apart by stone walls. Another rule also is, that no medical relief is to be afforded to the wife or children of an able-bodied man, because relief to them is relief to him. If he is himself ill, the medical 594 officer is to attend, but his wife and children are to be left to die. The guardians of the Petworth Union have strongly remonstrated against the first of the above orders; have begged to be allowed a discretionary power in extreme cases of taking some of the children into the poor-house, and this, their reasonable request has been absolutely refused. They met yesterday, and unanimously resolved not again to form a Board, or in any way to make themselves the instruments of such unheard-of cruelties. More than thirty women attended the Board yesterday with cries and lamentations, and praying that relief which the guardians are not permitted to give. I suppose that it is in mere mockery they are called guardians. And the same gentleman had since written to him as follows:— Daily cases of great suffering are brought forward: one was mentioned to me to-day, of a person lying forty-eight hours in excruciating torture, for want of that medical aid which was refused to be ordered for him by the relieving officer, and which was at length bestowed gratuitously by a medical man of this town, who lives out of the union in which the poor creature was thus relieved, from motives of mere compassion. Under the present system of medical treatment, or rather lack of treatment, many must die. First, the relieving officer is to be found—he may be miles away; then the medical men, who may be as far off in another direction. Meanwhile the father or mother of a large family is dying in agony, or seeing one of their children in that state. He (Mr. Walter) should only add to these statements, that they came from a gentleman who had no original objection to a change in the administration of the old law.

§ The Speaker
wished to know whether this letter formed any portion of the petition?

§ Mr. Walter
replied in the negative.

§ The Speaker
said, that if the hon. Member wished to produce a general discussion on the subject of the Poor-laws, the course for him to pursue was to present this petition, to move that it be printed with the votes, and then to give notice of a day for taking it into consideration.

Mr. Waller
said, that though, from the unwillingness of the House to hear all that could be fairly said on this subject, he must omit much of what he had intended to state, this he would say, that Lord Althorp had expressly declared in that House that it was not intended to do away with out-door relief in all cases. How far the practice had failed to coincide with that noble Lord's professions, the petition which he should now 595 have the honour to present painfully attested. It was signed by two magistrates, by the rector of Petworth, by six other clergymen of the neighbourhood, by thirteen guardians of the poor, and nearly 300 ratepayers; and he (Mr. Walter) believed that no petition had ever been presented which, from the severity of the evils denounced by it, and the character and station of those who denounced them, more thoroughly deserved the attention of the House.

§ Major Beauclerk
had been requested to support the prayer of this petition, and he looked upon it as one that was eminently deserving of the serious attention of the House. The fact was, that this subject was attracting the attention of the people all over the country. It was well known that a petition most numerously signed had been transmitted, within the last few days, from the town of Leicester to the noble Viscount who was at the head of his Majesty's Government. The petition in question was signed by thousands, and the petitioners did not send it to that House because they had observed, that whenever the question of the Poor-laws was introduced there, the subject excited the distaste and impatience of hon. Members. The discussion that had arisen on the present occasion would certainly tend to strengthen that impression. He had repeated applications on the subject from medical men, who were not able to perform the duties assigned them in the districts for which they had contracted. They all concurred in expressing their readiness to do all in their power to meet the wants of the poor, but they submitted that, in the matter of medical aid the Legislature should not be stingy towards the poorer classes, who were not able to provide such aid for themselves. He fully concurred in that opinion, and he thought that common justice to the people of this country required that the administration of the Poor-law Act should be altered and amended.

Lord George Lennox
, as one of the Representatives of that part of Sussex from which this petition came, might be expected to have something to say upon the subject. He, however, knew nothing of the petition, or of the intention of the hon. Member to present it, until the present moment, and the hon. Member had given him no notice whatever of the contents of it. He felt that he had a right to complain of that circumstance, as, had he previously known the statements in the petition, he might have been able to make an inquiry on the 596 subject, and to give an explanation of them.

§ Mr. Wakley
said, that it was with regret he saw that the complaints of the poor met with such a reception in that House from a liberal Parliament, and a liberal Ministry. If such was to be a sample of what they were to expect from them hereafter, he would say that the sooner there was an end to such a liberal Ministry the better. When the sufferings and grievances under which the poor laboured were brought before the House, the greatest impatience was manifested by hon. Members. Now, he felt it his duty to protest against such a course of proceeding. He recollected that the other day, when a petition was presented from three individuals, who had been officers in the East-India Company's service, there was a discussion that lasted for an hour and twenty minutes. When, however, the poor came before the House, the utmost impatience was manifested at their complaints, and the hon. Member who had their petition in his charge was scarcely able to obtain a hearing. It appeared to him that such conduct was anything but creditable to the character of the House. The complaints as to the administration of the Poor-law Act, were universal throughout the country. He would give some which had reached himself. He was informed, that in the union of Stowmarket, there being two old persons in the workhouse, husband and wife, of whom the husband was blind, the wife was not allowed to attend her decrepit old partner on his death bed until a special order came down for the purpose from the Poor-law Commissioners in London. Another fact was, that a woman who was neglected by the medical man employed by the union for the space of two months, sent for another practitioner to attend her. The Poor-law officer shortly afterwards called upon her, and desired to know who it was that she had employed; and on her informing him, he told her, that unless she employed the person selected by the union, her relief should be suspended. She was obliged accordingly to do so. The disease with which she was affected was one of great bodily suffering, and yet she was obliged to give up the medical attendant of her choice. Unless she had done so she would have been consigned to starvation. Practices such as these would not be long endured by the people of this country, and it would be a disgrace to the Legislature if it did not interfere for their protection.

§ Mr. Hume
wished to know whether his hon. Friend knew of these facts of his own 597 knowledge. He was as anxious as any man could be to see the Poor-law Act administered with leniency and humanity. He would submit to his hon. Friend, and to the hon. Member who had presented the petition, that if such serious charges against the Poor-law Commissioners came under their notice, let them move for an inquiry on the subject, and he would second the motion. But he would appeal to both hon. Members, whether they were not liable to be led astray by the representations of interested parties. He thought that the informations given to his hon. Friend, the Member for Finsbury, would, upon inquiry be found not to be correct. He was satisfied that whenever the question came under discussion, the conduct of the Poor-law Commissioners would be borne out and justified by facts.

Mr. George F.
Young said, he would recommend the hon. Member for Berkshire to fix a day for bringing the subject of the petition he had presented under the consideration of the House.

§ Mr. Wakley
said, that the statement he had made to the House had been communicated to him by the medical man who had been in attendance on the poor woman. He would furnish his name and address to the noble Lord, the Secretary of State for the Home Department.

§ Lord J. Russell
was not aware that any such order had been made; indeed, if it had, it would have come under his notice as one of the general rules. He would take this opportunity to say a word as to the statement of the hon. Member for Finsbury. He should certainly have an inquiry instituted into the facts of that statement. He must say, however, that even upon the hon. Member's own showing there was not that in it which he seemed to think. One of the general rules made by the Poor-law Commissioners was, that husbands and wives should be separated in workhouses. Surely it was necessary, when an exception was to be made, that there should be a special order for it. In the case also, it was one of the rules that the poor receiving relief must be attended by the medical 598 man employed by the union. Where an exception was to be made, a special order would be also requisite for the purpose.

§ Mr. Bonham
said, that the House was greatly indebted to the hon. Member for Berkshire for bringing this subject under its notice. He hoped that the hon. Member would not stop there, but that he would appoint an early day for a discussion of the question. He also hoped that his Majesty's Ministers would give the hon. Member an opportunity to bring the matter forward. He said so, because it was in the power of Ministers, at this period of the Session, to prevent a discussion on the subject if they chose.

§ Mr. Arthur Trevor
said, that facts analogous to those stated by the hon. Member for Finsbury had been brought under his notice in respect to unions in the north of England. The subject was one that the House must take up.

§ Mr. Wilks
also hoped, that the hon. Member for Berkshire would fix a day for the discussion of this subject. Though the petition had been signed by labourers alone, it would be entitled to the serious attention of the House; but it was signed also by the magistrates, clergymen, and other respectable persons of the district. He repeated, therefore, that it merited the serious attention of the House. Innumerable complaints had reached him from all parts of the country with regard to the conduct of the Poor-law Commissioners, who violated the principles of religious liberty, and imposed taxes on parishes for the support of the Church. These Commissioners had taken upon them to do that which no Ministry would venture to do, and which no Legislature would dare to do. He trusted that the Session would not close without a discussion on the subject.

§ Mr. Walter
said, that he should not fail to adopt the advice given him by Gentlemen on the opposite side of the House, and that he should certainly fix an early day for the purpose of bringing forward this subject in another shape. With regard to the complaint of the noble Lord (Lord G. Lennox), that he had not been made acquainted with the contents of the petition, he (Mr. Walter) had only to say that he had brought the petition down to the House every day for the last eight or nine days, that he had mentioned its contents to other hon. Members connected with the county of Sussex who sat on the same bench with the noble Lord, and that he had actually given notice of the presentation of the petition more than a week ago. He would 599 now move, after the petition was laid on the table, that it be printed and circulated with the votes.