LORD HOUGHTON, in rising to move for—
Return of the Number of Unions or Parishes that have availed themselves of the Act of 29th July, 186i, enabling them to receive from the Metropolitan Board of Works the Sums of Money expended in the Relief of the casual Poor; of the Amount of Money hitherto so expended; and of the Unions where the Guardians have provided new Wards or other Places of Reception for this Class of Poor since the passing of the above mentioned Act"—said, his object in moving for this Return was to obtain information as to the operation of an Act which had been passed at the end of last Session, called the Poor Relief (Metropolis) Act. That Act had been passed with the most benevolent intentions. Its object was to enable the London parishes to provide fuller accommodation for the large mass of destitute persons to be found in this populous city. That Act gave to the London parishes new and considerable advantages. It enabled them to make the police act as relieving officers, so as, in some degree, to distinguish the really destitute from the fraudulent vagrants; and it also gave the parishes power to reimburse themselves for money spent under that Act by the action of the Metropolitan Board of Works, the effect of which action would be that the burden of providing for the destitute poor would not fall wholly upon individual parishes, but 97 would be distributed over the whole metropolis. By that provision parishes had been encouraged to make liberal provision for the relief of the houseless poor. The present winter had certainly not been a very severe one, and, therefore, there was no reason to suppose that there were more destitute persons than in other winters; but their Lordships must be aware that there never had been a winter in which the destitution of the poor of London had been made so large a subject of comment and inquiry. Most of their Lordships must have received repeated communications, not only from public personages, but also from ladies of high station, who had devoted themselves to the object of establishing night refuges for the houseless poor. A large number of refuges had been established, and, as the columns of The Times had shown, an immense sum of money had been subscribed. Therefore, there was this curious fact—that there had been larger demands than usual upon public charity at the very time when Parliament had just passed an Act, the effect of which should have been to have provided for the wants of the destitute poor without the necessity of any appeal to private benevolence. There could be no doubt that the relief of the really destitute poor could be best administered through the legal means of the Poor Law, and for this reason—that if the destitute poor were once encouraged to depend upon private charity a great deal would be done towards preventing those persons from aspiring to the position of the labouring men, and from seeking an honest living for themselves. He hoped that the Returns he moved for would show what had been done under the Act of last Session. He was informed that it would be shown that the Act had been largely applied; that many wards had been provided for the reception of the houseless poor, but that the effect of the refuges established by private charity had been to prevent the destitute poor from availing themselves of the parochial wards. If such a state of things was allowed to continue, the effect would be to draw to the metropolis a large portion of the vagrant population of the entire country. Those persons would know that in hard times they could always obtain food and shelter in the refuges of London, and thus the effect of charitable efforts would be to increase to a large extent the pauperism of the land. He could not, of course, state what the Returns would absolutely prove, 98 but he was quite sure that the subject was one of great importance and well deserving the attention of the Poor Law Board.
§ EARL GRANVILLEsaid, the subject was no doubt highly important, but it was not a matter to be easily disposed of, although it would certainly receive due attention. There was no objection to the production of the Returns.
THE EARL OF LONGFORDremarked, that the metropolitan railway improvements, for which Bills would come before Parliament in the present year, would drive from 12,000 to 14,000 people out of their dwellings.