¹ And largely as opposed to woman.

² Booth, C., Old Age Pensions and the Aged Poor, p. 15Google Scholar.

³ A point of view consistently put forward by The Nation in the years preceding the Old Age Pensions Act 1908. A good contrast in the attitudes towards old age can be found by reading The Nation, 30 11 1907Google Scholar, arguing that poverty in old age is largely the result of the system and Cd. 4499, para. 357 (1909), arguing that social policies themselves create the problem.

⁴ C. 7684 of 1895, Minutes of Evidence submitted to the Royal Commission on the Aged Poor, Lord Methuen, Q. 5706.

⁵ Charles Loch's statement, C. 7684, p. cviii, para. 10 et al. To clarify the problem of the true extent of pauperism, let alone its significance and proper treatment, proved very difficult. The day count of 1 Aug. 1890 gave a total of 286,867 paupers over 60 (H. of C. Paper No. 36 of 1890, Mr Burt's Return). Cd. 67, para. 127, estimated 17-9 per cent of total population over 65 as paupers at that time. The day count on 1 Jan. 1892 gave a total of 268,397 paupers over 65 or 19-5 per cent of total age group (H. of C. Paper No. 265 of 1892, Mr Ritchie's Return). The day count of 31 March 1906 gave 379,902 paupers over 60 estimated at either 15-7 or 148 per cent of total age group (Cd. 4499, Part IV, para. 348 and Part II, para. 92). The numbers thus remained of comparable magnitude throughout the period. Women considerably outnumbered men.

It was recognized that in some cases a pension would not meet their needs. See C. 7684 of 1895 stating that sickness or infirmity rather than old age itself was the cause of pauperism for many of the elderly; also H. of C. Paper No. 296 of 1899, para. 11, most elderly indoor paupers were there because they needed care; also H. of C. Paper No. 276 of 1903, Appendix 10, in 21 Poor Law unions only 10 per cent of the elderly in the workhouse proved on examination Footnote 5 (cont.)

to be able and willing to live outside. See, too, the work of an independent investigator Sellers, E., ‘Old Age Pensions and the Belongingless Poor’, Contemporary Review (02 1908)Google Scholar. She estimated that of 2200 persons over 65 she visited in the workhouse, only 800 were really capable of living outside.

In consequence, some considered that the number of persons on out-relief, or even the number on out-relief less those receiving medical relief only, gave a truer picture. Taking Mr Ritchie's Return to illustrate the difference, we find that total paupers over 65 number 268,397; on out-relief number 205,045; on out-relief excluding applications for medical relief alone number 201,000.

There was the further difficulty that the pauper figures did not distinguish between the person receiving a small amount of help in an emergency and the person continually receiving assistance. Mr Chamberlain was forced to admit that, if such a distinction could be made, the argument for pensions drawn from pauper figures would be considerably reduced (C. 7684, QQ. 12171, 12172).

The protagonists of pensions considered the figures underestimated the extent of poverty in old age. First, a day count (especially one taken on a summer's day in a prosperous year as was Butt's) was unrealistic. Constructing a yearly count, Booth amended Burt's figure of 286,867 to 409,851 or 259 per cent of total population over 65 (Pauperism and the Endowment of Old Age, pp. 163, 158). This compares with 29-3 per cent using Mr Ritchie's Return. Secondly, the considerable jump in the proportion of an age group reduced to pauperism at the age of 60 and again at 65 pointed to age as an independent causative factor. See Booth, C., Old Age Pensions and the Aged Poor, p. 13Google Scholar; also C. 7684, paras. 21 and 22; also Cd. 4499, Part n, para. n. Thirdly, the significant relationship was pauper incidence to working class, not total population. Mr Burt argued ( Burt, T., ‘Old Age Pensions’, The Nineteenth Century, 09 1906Google Scholar) that the 1890 figures showed about one third of the working classes over 65 were on relief and that one out of every two working men and women were ‘more or less dependent on the rates in their old age’. A loose statement in which no definition of the working class is given. Booth claimed ‘not less than 40% of workers and small traders’ were so dependent (Old Age Pensions and the Aged Poor, p. v). J. Chamberlain asserted that three out of seven of the working-class population over 65, or nearly one in two, applied for poor relief (Hansard, 4th scries, vol. LXIX, col. 69).

C. 7684, QQ. 57I4-15.

⁷ Cd. 67, para. 3.

⁸ C. 7684, paras. 33 and 34.

⁹ Cd. 4499, Part IV, para. 357. Thus throwing doubt on the meaning of the pauper figures. The statement must, of course, contain a core of truth of unknowable size.

¹⁰ Cf. 1908 Non-Contributory Pensions. 5s. weekly scaled down on means.

¹¹ Cd. 4499, Part iv, para. 358.

¹¹ Cd. 4499, Part iv, para. 359.

¹³ Booth, Quoted, Old Age Pensions and the Aged Poor, p. 73Google Scholar.

¹⁴ This school never really dealt adequately with the question of how people could save; especially women workers and those in irregular, low-paid jobs. The Royal Commission of 1895 (paras. 239-40) had recognized that this was a different problem from the man in regular employment but gave no indication of how to deal with it. See, too, Miss Hill's evidence on labourer's savings. ‘How they managed to do so, she could not say, but if they can, the rest can’ (QQ. 10559-60).

¹⁵ C. 7684, Q. 10452.

¹⁶ C. 8911 of 1898.

¹⁷ See, for example, Turner, G., The Case for State Pensions in Old Age, Fabian Tracts, no. 73 (1899)Google Scholar.

¹⁸ Old Age Pensions and the Aged Poor, p. 29.

¹⁹ Ibid. p. 54. Assuming 7s. weekly for men, 51. for women, 12s. for married couples from the age of 70.

²⁰ 11 Jan. 1908.

²¹ Cd. 3618, p. 15.

²² C. 7684, Q. 13919. He makes it quite clear it is faute de mieux,

²³ C. 7684, para. 332. ‘But the probability of agitation in the direction indicated is a point which cannot, we feel, be ignored.’

²⁴ There would be no objection, he thought, to extending his scheme to women if it was found practicable to do so but he argued his proposal entirely in masculine terms.

²⁵ See the supporting evidence of Hutchinson, J., ‘Can the Working Classes Save?’, The Nineteenth Century (02 1908)Google Scholar.

²⁶ Blackley gives no source for these figures, although others seem not to have challenged them. On our standards this seems a savage rate of saving, being 40 per cent of weekly income. Today the maximum which it is felt can be taken from £9 per week wage earners is 13s. 8d., i.e. 7-6 per cent.

²⁷ But a later article of his in 1880 hinted that investment policies might cause trouble.

²⁹ G. Turner, op. cit.

²⁹ The administrative difficulties of including the self-employed or the irregularly employed were considered overwhelming (see C. 7684, Q. 12193).

³⁰ C. 7684, para. 309.

³¹ ‘These schemes for self-protection, on the whole, reflect the greatest credit on the independent spirit, intelligence, business capacity, and powers of self-government of our manual workers and excite the admiration and envy of foreigners’ (Rev. Ede, W. Moore, ‘National Pensions. One Way out of Darkest England’, Contemporary Review, 03 1891)Google Scholar.

³² C. 7684, paras. 213-14.

³³ Ibid. para. 216.

³⁴ In 1893, there were 458,678 persons in unions and societies, covered by the Board of Trade return, which at that time paid superannuation benefits, but some of the sums involved were minute (see C. 7808 of 1895, p. 3). By 1905, only 13,383 persons were actually receiving trade union superannuation benefit (see Cd. 3618, p. 22).

³⁵ Cd. 3618, p. 23, estimated about 58,000 pensioners of trade unions and Friendly Societies out of a total population over 65 of 2-1 million for the U.K. in 1907.

³⁶ C. 7684, para 208. It did not go deeply into the problem of lapses.

³⁷ H. of C. Paper No. 296 of 1899.

³⁸ Ibid. See Mr Lecky's draft report, esp. paras. 6 and 8. See also C. 7684, QQ. 1227-9.

³⁹ Presented by him to the Royal Commission of 1895. See C. 7684, paras. 310-42.

⁴⁰ Burt, T., ‘Old Age Pensions’, The Nineteenth Century (09 1906)Google Scholar.

⁴¹ C. 7684, Q. 12224.

⁴² Ibid. para. 315.

⁴³ Ibid. para. 328.

⁴⁴ ‘To consider whether any alterations in the system of Poor Law Relief are desirable, in the case of persons whose destitution is occasioned by incapacity for work resulting from old age, or whether assistance could otherwise be afforded in those cases.’

⁴⁵ The commission was aware of the difficulties of interpreting Poor Law figures.

⁴⁶ C. 7684, para. 27.

⁴⁷ C. 7684, para. 169.

⁴⁸ Ibid. para. 89.

⁴⁹ Ibid. para. 91.

⁵⁰ L.G.B. Circulars of July 1896 and Aug. 1900 are particularly relevant. See L.G.B. Annual Reports, 1896-7, pp. 7-9; 1900-1, pp. 18-19.

⁵¹ C. 7684, report by Mr Broadhurst, para. 1.

⁵² C. 8911 of 1898.

⁵³ Ibid, paras. 34 and 69.

⁵⁴ Ibid, paras. 37, 59 and 62.

⁵⁵ There was no longer any question of whether anything should be done or not.

⁵⁶ H. of C. Paper No. 296 of 1899, Report of the Select Committee on the Aged and Deserving Poor.

⁵⁷ C. 67 of 1900, Report of the Departmental Committee.

⁵⁸ Space does not allow treatment. See, for example, Webb, S., Paupers and Old Age Pensions, Fabian Tracts, no. 135 (11 1907)Google Scholar; also The Economist, 11 Jan. 1908; also Cd. 4499, minority report.

⁵⁹ 8 Edward VII, c. 40.

⁶⁰ The introduction of a sliding scale was one amendment introduced as a result of criticism.

⁶¹ H. of C. Paper No. 304 of 1908 sets out the regulations.

⁶² The act became operative one year later.

⁶³ Examples would be vaccination, provision of school meals under 1906 Education (Provision of Meals) Act.

⁶⁴ Hansard, 5th series, vol. 191, col. 393.

⁶⁵ The new service required a new administration.

⁶⁶ Cd. 7015 of 1913, p. 3. The percentage decrease is 94.9 per cent on the outdoor figures only.