PAROCHIAL SETTLEMENTS. (Hansard, 21 February 1828)

§ Mr. Potter Macqueen
rose, pursuant to notice, to move for a select committee" to take into consideration the Law of Parochial Settlements." The hon. member said, that after deliberating whether be should embody at once the alterations which he proposed to make in the laws relating to parochial settlement into a distinct bill, or ask for a committee of inquiry, he had thought it his duty to prefer the latter mode; because, if it should be thought that there was too much of novelty in his views, they would be better digested and come with stronger recommendation from the hon. members whom he intended to propose as a committee.—The first objection against the laws relative to parochial settlements was, that they were founded upon ancient habits of serfship, and militated against the liberty of the subject. Under the present system, the unfortunate pauper, on the approach of illness, age, or disability, might, together with his family, be dragged like criminals from one end of the country to the other, that they were finally lodged in some obscure parish, where, according to the opinion of any two magistrates in the vicinity, they had done some act to entitle them to a settlement. This harsh and evil policy had been strongly deprecated by sir William Blackstone and by Mr. Pitt. The former had declared, in his Commentaries that, "notwithstanding the pains which have been taken about the laws of settlement, they still remain very imperfect, and inadequate to the purposes they are designed for: a fate that has generally attended most of our statute laws, where they have not the foundation I of the common law to build on. When the shires, the hundreds, and the tithings, were kept in the same admirable order, that they were disposed in by the great Alfred, there were no persons idle; consequently none but the impotent that needed relief; and the 43rd Statute of I Elizabeth seems entirely founded on the same principle. But when this excellent scheme was neglected and departed from, we cannot but observe with concern, what 603 miserable shifts and lame expedients have from time to time been adopted, in order to patch up the flaws occasioned by this neglect." Mr. Pitt also had, in the year 1796, declared in that House, that the law of settlement "had been peculiarly prejudicial to industry; for, by preventing the circulation of labour, it had increased the burthens of the country, and by oppressing individuals diminished the riches of the state."—The hon. member then referred to the statutes of Richard 2nd, Henry 7th, and Edward 6th, c. 1, which were enacted to repress "vagabondry," and directed the poor to repair to the place where they were born, or were most conversant with for three years;—to the modification of these laws by the act of James 1st, which reduced this qualification to one year; and to the 43rd of Elizabeth. During her long reign, a system of miserable expedients might be traced, of entreating, asking, demanding, and enforcing, charity. To the provisions of the act made in the latter period of her reign, might be attributed, no less the present miserable burthen on the landed interest, than the wretched and humiliating degradation of the poor themselves. From that time to the Restoration, in the 13th and 14th of Charles 2nd, the statutes so rapidly multiplied, that regular notice of them would be almost impossible. He would therefore turn to the heads of settlement, in order to ascertain what clauses might be satisfactorily pointed out for revision; or, if it should be thought fit, for extirpation.—The first was the "Law of Hiring, and Service." Exclusive of the extravagant litigation which, from the number of appeal causes—three thousand in three years—which the law as it at present stood gave rise to, the effect was most pernicious, as far as it regarded the moral condition of the poor. Some years ago, said the hon. member, the residence of every respectable farmer presented a school for domestic and agricultural pursuits. It contained a number of hired servants of both sexes, who dwelt under the same roof, and not unfrequently lived at the same board with their masters and mistresses. They were, consequently, identified with their prosperity; and anxious to repay the kindness they experienced, by every attention to the interests of their employers. There they acquired habits of honesty, sobriety, and regular industry; there, too, the romance of humble life was 604 played off, and instead of rushing into precipitate marriage, as at present, the parties remained in service a few years, reserving their mutual wages, and then coming together with the full consent and approbation of their employers, to whom they looked for support and encouragement in after life. What was now the contrast? At present, the farmer dared not hire a labourer out of another parish, for fear he should become an inmate of his own; and when he looked to that parish he found the demand so inadequate to the supply, that he was unfortunately too often induced to prefer the wretched system of roundsmen to that of the fairly remunerated and independent labourer.—Another, and a most important branch of the general subject was settlement by marriage. That the wife should follow the settlement of the husband appeared at first sight only just and reasonable, but to the perversion of this law much evil might be attributed.—At present, a female of the poorest class had not only no motive to preserve her character, but on the contrary, she had every inducement to forfeit her reputation; as, by so doing, she was likely to obtain not merely a husband, but, what was to her of much greater consequence, a right to select a certain parish, and by swearing her child to a man of that parish, compel him to marry her. The consequence of these forced marriages was obvious; the peasantry were married whilst mere children, and before they had formed any virtuous or lasting attachments; certainly, before they had laid by any reserve to meet the future exigencies of a family. They considered that family as the property of the parish which must maintain them. They were brought up dependent upon the parish, and independent of their parents; and in fact—to use an expression formerly applied—as legitimate paupers.—What he hoped to effect was, that in so serious and solemn a moral obligation, no legal compulsion whatever should be exerted: there might, probably, be difficulties, chiefly as to providing for natural children; still, no system of general policy which militated against domestic morality could be publicly justified. Now, the most simple and efficacious remedy in this case would be to enact, that in all cases where a child might be born within six months of the marriage of the parents, such a child should belong to the parish of the mother, and not of the 605 father. This would put a stop to the juggling system of overseers, who urged their own females to lay their children to men of other parishes, in the hope of removing them; quite forgetful, that the evil was reciprocal, and that if an overseer got rid of three or four females in a year under these circumstances, the same number of his own young men must have been driven into marriage; and thus this wretched system had, consequently, proceeded with mutual infliction of severity.—This measure would also teach the overseer what he ought to have known long ago—that he; ought rather to apply the power with which he was armed to the prevention of mischief —that he ought to look to the early habits of his youthful poor, and endeavour to repress the first symptoms of evil, instead of hoping to profit by the completion of that evil. But, above all, it would teach one most important lesson to the female herself; namely, that as the law, by its strongest enactments had made her the guardian of her own character, such she must remain; and that she would have to attribute her after-success in life to the preservation of her reputation, instead of, as at present, the forfeiture of it.—The hon. member concluded by moving for the appointment of the said committee.

Colonel Wood
said, he thought it would be advisable to give the powers of the committee a wider range, as there were many other points, with respect to the Poor Laws, which must necessarily force themselves upon their consideration. In some parts of the country, the rate of wages was so low, that even a single man could with difficulty support himself without parochial aid. It was not his intention to trespass upon the attention of the House on that occasion; but if no other member took the matter up, he should feel it his duty to move, that the committee should have power to embrace the more general question of the Poor-laws.

The Attorney General
said, he could not promise to give his general attendance at the committee, in consequence of his professional avocations. What assistance he could afford short of such attendance, he was very willing to contribute.

§ Mr. Macqueen
declared himself satisfied with the occasional assistance of the hon. and learned gentleman.