UNEMPLOYED WORKMEN. (Hansard, 18 April 1905)

§ THE PRESIDENT OF THE LOCAL GOVERNMENT BOARD (Mr. GERALD BALFOUR,) Leeds, Central
The origin of the Bill which I have the honour of introducing is to be found in the scheme for dealing with the unemployed in the Metropolis which was started by the right hon. Member for South Bristol who preceded me in my present office. It proposes to establish local bodies in each of the Metropolitan boroughs, and a central body for the whole area, corresponding to the joint committees set up under the scheme of my right hon. friend which, I think, has, by common consent, done its work well. The duty of the local bodies, corresponding to the joint committees of the existing scheme, will be to inquire into cases of applicants for employment, and to divide these applicants into two classes—first, the class honestly desirous of obtaining work but temporarily unable to do so, owing to exceptional causes over which they have no control; and, secondly, applicants who should be regarded as proper subjects for ordinary Poor Law relief. For applicants of the former class it will be the duty of the local bodies to endeavour to obtain employment. The central body will be charged with the general supervision over the local bodies, and also with the establishment of labour exchanges and employment registers. The Bill makes an important distinction between obtaining employment for applicants and providing work for them. The local bodies will have it as one of their functions to endeavour to obtain employment for applicants, but they will not be empowered to provide work for them. They will not be entitled to become themselves employers of labour or to arrange for applicants being employed by other persons in return for contributions to the cost. The provision of work for applicants will be reserved entirely for the central body, and even in the case of the central body it will be entirely discretionary. The central body, of course, will examine into any case referred to them by the local bodies, but it will be within their own discretion to deal with those cases or not. It will be entirely within their own discretion whether they are to provide work for those cases or not; still 460 less, of course, will there be anything in the nature of a claim on the part of applicants themselves to have work provided for them.
I have to note two important differences between this and the scheme at present in operation. The joint committees and the central committee, under the scheme of my right hon. friend the present Chief Secretary for Ireland, were voluntary bodies, and the central fund depended, as a matter of fact, entirely upon voluntary subscriptions. The local bodies and central bodies it is proposed to establish in the Bill will be statutory and permanent bodies, and the central body will be, to a limited extent, and for certain clearly defined objects, entitled to draw upon the rates for its support. The question of whether money of the ratepayers should be used for the purposes contemplated in this Bill is, of course, a very important one. and one which, at a later stage, will, no doubt, receive the full consideration it deserves from the House. I will content myself at this stage with making two remarks upon the question. In the first place, it seems to me it would be impossible to set up statutory bodies, permanent bodies for statutory duties, and leave them entirely dependent upon voluntary subscriptions for their maintenance; and, in the second place, the Government do not disguise from themselves the importance of the new departure they are making. The matter has been carefully considered, and we think, within the limits; laid down and subject to the conditions imposed in connection with provisional labour, that the experiment is one which, can be made without any undue risk. These limits affect not merely the total amount on which the rates can be drawn upon, but also the objects to which contributions from the rates may be devoted. With regard to the amount, that will be an equalised rate, each Metropolitan borough contributing according to its rateable value, and it will be limited to ½d. in the £, or it may be extended to Id. in the £ with the special leave of the Local Government Board. No money drawn from the rates may be spent in providing relief works other than those on a farm colony. Speaking broadly, the arrangement comes to this: 461 the rates may be drawn upon to provide and maintain the regular organisation which the Bill sets up, but the rates may not be drawn upon to provide work otherwise than on a farm colony established by the central body.
There are other provisions of the Bill on which I should like to have said a word had I sufficient time at my disposal. The chief of these is the organisation which is provided outside London, and which differs in certain important particulars from that provided in the Metropolis itself. The organisation outside will be on a much more optional footing. It will not be compulsory either for borough or city councils to set up the organisation which is being provided for London. I cannot go now into the conditions under which work may be provided by the central body and the power of the Local Government Board to make general regulations both for this and other purposes, but when hon. Members get the Bill in their hands T think the provisions that we have made will appear intelligible. In conclusion, I can only express my regret that it is not the lot of the right hon. Member for South Bristol to introduce this measure, of which he is the real parent. If it finds favour with the House, and has the good fortune to pass into law, and if it proves successful in dealing with great evils, then any credit that attaches to that success will be associated with my right hon. friend's name.
Motion made, and Question proposed, "That leave be given to bring in a Bill to establish organisation with a view to the provision of employment or assistance for Unemployed Workmen in proper cases."—(Mr. Gerald Balfour.)

§ MR. SYDNEY BUXTON (Tower Hamlets, Poplar)
said he thought he was expressing the general feeling of the House in saying they regretted that the Chief Secretary for Ireland had not himself been able to introduce the Bill, because they knew that last autumn and since he had taken a great personal interest in this important question. It was a little difficult in the very short speech of the right hon. Gentleman to follow exactly what were the proposals of the Bill. But he should like to say, 462 on his own behalf at all events, that he hoped and desired that this question should, as far as possible, not be in any sense a Party question, though, of course, some of them might hold views which went considerably further than those expressed by the right hon. Gentleman. He confessed he had listened with some disappointment to his speech. It appeared to him that the Bill, instead of extending the position and powers of the central body, and of the Local Government Board, as foreshadowed in the scheme of the late President of the Local Government Board, placed limitations and restrictions upon the powers of the central body with regard to the provision of employment and the receipt of funds.

§ MR. GERALD BALFOUR
I do not think so. Perhaps I may make it clear. We propose that the central fund should be provided to some extent by voluntary subscriptions, and with regard to those subscriptions that the central body should be able to do everything which the central committee under the scheme of my right hon. friend was enabled to do.

§ MR. SYDNEY BUXTON
said that under the existing voluntary scheme of the right hon. Gentleman the central committee not only had the voluntary subscriptions, but it was clearly the intention of the right hon. Gentleman last August to ask the various borough councils to contribute from the rates to the central fund, in order to provide work. Unfortunately, some borough councils declined to do that, and, therefore, that part of the right hon. Gentleman's scheme fell to the ground, and to that extent the benefits derived from it were very largely handicapped last autumn. He confessed that he hoped that under the Bill not only would the borough councils be able to apply the rates for the provision of work in bona fide cases, but that the aid from the rates in that respect would not be confined entirely to employing men on farm colonies.

§ MR. GERALD BALFOUR
And organisation.

§ MR. SYDNEY BUXTON
And organisation. That was to say that the only work which was to be provided out of the public fund was work on the farm colonies. To that extent he agreed with the Bill, but he should like to see it go further, and to the extent the right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary proposed last autumn, viz., that these public funds should not be confined entirely to one simple object, but that the Central Authority should have full discretion as to the mode and method of providing work for bona fide unemployed. It appeared to him that the Bill, in these respects, fell short of what he had hoped from it. It was, however, after all, an important fact that a Government, and a Conservative Government, should introduce a Bill of this sort. To his mind this was a great step in advance and a real departure in regard to social legislation. What had fallen from the right hon. Gentleman went to show that, as regarded London, at all events, there was now a definite recognition that there was an obligation on the local authorities, and on some central authority, he would not say to provide work where it was demanded, but to exercise discretion in providing work for those who were suffering from want of employment from no fault of their own. There was the further recognition—an important one—involved in the imposition of a uniform rate, that the poor of London were to be a common charge upon the whole of London. They were to have an equality of burdens as far as they could for this object. This was only what ought to have been done years ago. London was the only great city in the country in which the poor were not a common charge upon the whole town. It was only in London that the burden was heaviest where it ought to be lightest.
On one very important point he could not agree with the Bill. He considered that the system which it was proposed to set up in London should be set up everywhere under equally advantageous circumstances. Nothing we aid be more fatal than to set up a compulsory system in London and not an equally compulsory system throughout the rest of the country. He was afraid if this were done, that last state of London would be 464 worse than the first. He hoped the right hon. Gentleman's mind would be open to suggestions which, as far as he was concerned, would be made in no hostile spirit to the general principle and object of the Bill, suggestions such as those for making it compulsory in the outside districts as well as in London; and to improve the Bill in other respects. He was somewhat disappointed with what appeared to him to be the limitations contained in the Bill. Many of them on that side of the House, indeed all of them, were favourable to some proposal of this sort; and he would appeal to the right hon. Gentlemen to meet them in regard to reasonable Amendments in a friendly-spirit in order that this might be made a practicable and working measure, capable of achieving the purpose which he was sure the whole House desired.

§ SIR GEORGE BARTLEY (Islington, N.)
Might I ask the right hon. Gentleman whether the relief will be considered as Poor Law relief?

§ MR. GERALD BALFOUR
No, Sir.