POOR LAWS' AMENDMENT—COMMITTEE. (Hansard, 25 July 1834)

Lord Kenyon
objected to the arbitrary power given to the Commissioners, of consolidating parishes, as there were many cases in which there were parishes well-regulated, and with a small amount of Poor-rate, and it would be a hard case for such a parish to be mixed up with a parish where the rates were high and the affairs ill-managed. He should, therefore, propose, as an Amendment, that no parishes should be consolidated into a union without the written consent of a majority of the guardians of the poor and of the rate-payers in each district.

The Lord Chancellor
was not surprised that the noble Baron who was opposed to the fundamental principle of the Bill, should propose this Amendment. It was, however, anything but an Amendment, for it would have the effect of crippling the Bill in one of its most material features, and, in a great measure, of preventing that change by which it was intended to return to the old and salutary system, which taught every man to depend on his own industry, on his own resources, to despise and hate as much to be a pauper at all, as to be a pauper receiving relief in a workhouse. It was generally found, as appeared by the Report, that when a man said he could not find work, the reason was he had not made the experiment; and it was almost invariably the case, that after being in the workhouse a little time, labourers got, out, and contrived to find 470 work elsewhere. This was the effect of the workhouse system, which was the best feature in the Bill, for it tended to restore to the lower classes that natural tone of which the mal-administration of these laws had almost divested them. The system had been tried in several places on a small scale with the happiest effect.

Lord Falmouth
supported the Amendment. He concurred in the principles stated by his noble friend (Lord Kenyon). Parishes varied much in circumstances; and it would be doing much injury to some parishes if they were united with a neighbouring parish.

The Earl of Radnor
said, that it was absurd to suppose the Commissioners would go into the country for the mere purpose of annoying and injuring one parish by joining it to another. There was no reason to suppose but that they would exercise their judgment in an impartial and proper manner.

Lord Falmouth
had no doubt they would: what he objected to was the principle.

The Earl of Winchilsea
supported the clause, and was rather surprised that the noble Baron should oppose it, considering how nearly he was connected with an extensive parish (Mary-la-bonne), in which the system of setting paupers hard to work and giving them necessaries instead of money, had reduced a body of paupers demanding relief in one week from nine hundred to fifty.

§ Lord Wynford
had no objection to the union of parishes, provided the parishes wished it, but their consent he considered indispensable, for it would be too bad to mix up a well-conducted and consequently prosperous parish, with an ill-conducted one. He was ready to admit, that the system of a union of parishes for the purpose of having one workhouse among them would be cheap; but many a thing was cheap which, so far from being desirable or proper, was most injurious to the country. And he was satisfied, that great evil would result from the intermixture of so many paupers together. There could be no question, that a great contamination of each other's morals would be the consequence. Paupers ought not to be so far removed from their friends as that they should not be able to visit them. The workhouses under the proposed Bill would, in fact, be several county prisons, in which paupers would be separated from 471 their friends. He thought that it ought to be left to the paupers themselves, provided they received the concurrence of the Magistrates, either to go to the workhouse, or to eat their meals at their own houses, or in the open air. That was the practice under the old law.

The Lord Chancellor
No, no.

§ Lord Wynford
Yes, yes.

§ Lord Wynford
resumed: He thought that if the Commissioners were to have the power to unite parishes, they ought also to have the power to dissolve such union when it was proved to be injurious. He repeated, that they ought to possess the power of dissolving, as well as of making unions, in order that they might be able to correct any evils which might be found in certain cases to result from uniting parishes together. He liked the old law, and they ought not to consent to any innovation in that law, unless the innovation could be proved to be an improvement. He would, therefore, support the Amendment of his noble friend.

The Lord Chancellor
said, that his noble and learned friend had completely misconceived the import of the observations which he had made, and also the object of the clause itself. The object of that clause was, to enable the Commissioners to unite a number of parishes together, which were too small to enable them to erect and support workhouses for themselves. His (the Lord Chancellor's) noble and learned friend had also completely mistaken the meaning of the 2nd George 2. There was no doubt that the Act in question gave the Magistrates the power of affording relief to paupers at their own houses. There was no doubt, he (the Lord Chancellor) repeated, that the Magistrates had the discretionary power of either sending paupers to the workhouses, or relieving them at their own houses; their Lordships all knew how that power had been abused. Wherever the power was exercised to advantage, that was the exception; the abuse of the power was the rule, and greatly had it been abused. His noble and learned friend had endeavoured to give the workhouse a bad name, which it certainly did not deserve, and which it certainly ought not to bear in the estimation of their Lordships. He could have no objection to his noble 472 and learned friend endeavouring to give the workhouse a bad name in the eyes of the paupers, because that might have the effect of impressing them with a horror of it, and consequently prove an inducement to them to do all they could to avoid it. But his noble and learned friend ought not to try to persuade their Lordships, that it deserved this bad name. His noble and learned friend had compared the workhouse, under the new system, to a great prison. The comparison was most unjust. There was all the difference in the world between a workhouse and a prison. Paupers were not compelled to enter the workhouse; they would go to it of their own freewill. It was different with regard to a prison. Men were obliged to go into it against their wills. Paupers could leave the workhouse when they liked; but men could not leave the prison when they liked. They were detained contrary to their inclinations; they could not get out of it. He wished that the noble and learned Lord would exert his eloquence, as he had already stated, against the workhouse, in the eyes of paupers, so as to prevent them going into it. His noble and learned friend's imagination had run away with him, and he had attributed to the Bill what was not to be found in it.

§ Lord Wynford
explained. It was not to workhouses generally he objected, but to those forced unions. Workhouses were very useful in particular parishes. The Bill gave the same discretionary power to the Commissioners as the Magistrates enjoyed before.

Lord Ellenborough
said, they must leave this clause in the Bill as it stood, if the object were to produce cheapness in the administration of the Poor-laws. With this view it would be necessary to give the Commissioners the power of uniting parishes. He thought that, in all cases above and under a certain age, children and infirm persons ought to be entitled to relief out of the workhouse at the discretion of the Magistrates of the district.

§ The Duke of Wellington
thought the question a very simple one. It was, whether parishes should be compelled to unite whether they liked it or not, without the consent of the guardians of the poor. He thought, that the establishment of workhouses, in the manner proposed, would tend to ameliorate the system. In many parishes there was not, at present, the means of erecting a work- 473 house, and those parishes could never have the advantage of one without uniting with other parishes.

The Lord Chancellor
There are 600 parishes that do not average a population of more than 300 souls each, and 9,000 parishes that do not average more than 500.

§ The Duke of Wellington
It was clear from this that, if the Magistrates considered a workhouse necessary, it could only be erected in any particular district by a union of parishes.

The Marquess of Lansdown
admitted, that the power it was proposed to grant to the Commissioners could only be justified by necessity; but that necessity being made out, as he thought it was, by the Report of the Commissioners, he could not see why they should not have the power of disuniting as well as of uniting parishes without the sanction of the guardians of the poor. If the necessity for constructing a workhouse for different parishes were made out, there was no other means of erecting it except under the power given by this clause. There was an instance of a parish in Gloucestershire, the administration of which was excellent; but the adjoining parishes refused to unite and afford the means of erecting a workhouse; and there was no power to compel them, except by the provisions of this Act. The Commissioners would, of course, in the union of parishes, take the opportunity of availing themselves of the large workhouses already constructed, and classify the parishes accordingly. It had been said, that the erection of workhouses would drive persons out of the parishes in which they were built; but, if it even had that effect, would not this be a stimulus to those persons to look out for work to avoid the workhouse?

The Duke of Buckingham
wished to know, if there was any objection to limit the space for which each workhouse should be built.

The Lord Chancellor
was rather in favour of a limited distance than any particular number of parishes; for instance, say a circumference of ten or twelve miles.

Lord Ellenborough
said, he was desirous of introducing here a clause which he thought their Lordships would not feel much difficulty in agreeing to. It was to this effect:—"That it may be lawful for any two Magistrates acting within any 474 city, borough, or hamlet, to direct that relief shall be given to any child under the age of three years, or to any infirm or aged persons above sixty years, without compelling such persons to reside in the workhouse, any rule or order of the Commissioners to the contrary notwithstanding." He was sure their Lordships would see how cruel and unnatural it must be to separate mother and child, or husband and wife, at an advanced age. He should not be surprised, if such violence to the feelings of persons in such tender relation to each other were to cause an insurrection. He hoped, therefore, their Lordships would see the advantage, and, indeed, the humanity of adopting the clause.

The Earl of Radnor
thought, that it would be better to give the power to the Commissioners than to the Magistrates.

Lord Ellenborough
said, that he thought the Magistrates were the most proper persons, as the Commissioners would not have the power to delegate any authority. He named the age of three years for a child, because he considered it much more natural and proper that an infant of that age should be under the care of its parents than in the care of a mercenary nurse.

§ Viscount Melbourne
had a strong objection to that part of the clause proposed by the noble Baron, which went to relieve children out of the workhouse, because it was totally at variance with the general principle of the Bill; and, besides, parents were obliged by law to support their children, even to the grandfather and grandmother. There was also another objection. A child of such tender years could claim no relief for itself; the application must be from the parents.

Lord Ellenborough
was disposed, after what had fallen from the noble Viscount opposite, to consent that that part of the clause, which applied to children, should be omitted.

The Archbishop of Canterbury
proposed an Amendment to the effect "that all workhouses should be under the care and superintendence of the Curate or Vicar of the respective parishes in which such workhouses were situated, and that the said Vicars or Curates might visit such 475 workhouses at all proper times, for the purpose of affording religious instruction to such of the inmates as professed the Established Religion, provided, that no pauper be obliged to attend divine worship contrary to the religious belief in which he or she had been brought up; nor should any child in the workhouse be instructed in the creed of any particular religion against the wishes or feelings of the natural parents or guardians of such child."

The Lord Chancellor
said, that the Amendment proposed by the most reverend Prelate appeared to him to embrace every object that was necessary.

The Archbishop of Canterbury
would have no objection to add to the Amendment, "that the workhouses should be open always to clergymen not of the Established Church."