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The New Poor Law and the Struggle for Union Chargeability

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  18 December 2008

Maurice Caplan
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While much has been heard in recent times of the evils attaching to “the principles of 1834”, other important aspects of the New Poor Law have been seriously neglected. The laws of settlement and removal were unjust and inhumane, and the system of parochial rating was anomalous, uneven and, indeed, thoroughly iniquitous. One of the main features of the Poor Law Amendment Act had been the grouping of the parishes of England and Wales into unions of parishes. Those of a medium-sized town usually constituted one union, while in the countryside the typical union tended to comprise all the parishes within a radius of up to about ten miles of a country town, its centre. Under the Act, the administration of the Poor Law was based on the union and not, as heretofore, on the parish; yet the latter remained the financial unit, each parish being chargeable for its own Poor Law expenditure. This uneven arrangement prevented the effective operation of the Act, and, as will be shown, had unhappy consequences. Attempts at reform in these matters were strenuously opposed in Parliament between 1845 and 1865, and only in the latter year was the Union Chargeability Act passed.

Type
Research Article
Information
International Review of Social History , Volume 23 , Issue 2 , August 1978 , pp. 267 - 300
Copyright
Copyright © Internationaal Instituut voor Sociale Geschiedenis 1978

References

1 This aspect is discussed at length in a leading article in The Times of 29 March 1865.

2 S., and Webb, B., English Poor Law History, Part II: The Last Hundred Years (London, 1929), p. 421.Google Scholar The terms of Graham's Bill are here detailed, but with the extraordinary omission of the settlement and rating clauses. Without them, the Webbs' comment on the rejection of the Bill by the Commons loses much of its point.

3 The Times, 13 February 1845.

4 Torrens, W. T. McCullagh, Life and Times of Sir James Graham (London, 1863), II, pp. 350–53.Google Scholar

5 Peel was quite explicit about this, Hansard, Third Series, LXXXIII, c. 267, 27 January 1846.

6 2 doubtful.

7 Hansard, Third Series, LXXXVII, cc. 44–51.

8 Ibid., cc. 51–102, 6 June.

9 Ibid., cc. 1069–71.

10 Ibid., cc. 1210–12.

11 Ibid., cc. 1386–87.

12 The voting was: Ayes, 56; Noes, 9; Majority 47. Hansard, LXXXVIII, c. 216, 30 July.

13 Pashley, R., Pauperism and the Poor Laws (London, 1852), p. 281Google Scholar; Redford, A., Labour Migration in England, 2nd ed. (Manchester, 1964), p. 128.Google Scholar

14 S. and B. Webb, The Last Hundred Years, op. cit., pp. 422–23.

15 Hansard, LXXXIX, cc. 320–34, 22 January 1847. The Committee, when appointed, was composed of seven members from one side of the House and eight from the other. They were from different parts of the country and represented town and rural areas fairly, and included those who had made a special study of the subject and were recognised authorities on it.

16 Hansard, XC, cc. 707–21, 2 March.

17 Hansard, XCIII, cc. 647–48 and 826–34, 16 and 23 June.

18 Described by the Webbs as a lifelong student of Poor Law administration. A successful barrister, was an MP from 1841 to 1847. The Last Hundred Years, p. 423, note 2.

19 Commons second reading, 8 July; Royal Assent, 23 July (10–11 Vict., c. 110).

20 Select Committee on Settlement and Poor Removal [Parliamentary Papers, 1847, XI).Google Scholar

21 Hansard, C, cc. 787–801, 25 July.

22 Although the very model of a country gentleman, he was the son of a London merchant. He affected to embody the traditional virtues of the squirearchy. Platitudinous and longwinded, he was dogged and untiring in defence of his own viewpoint.

23 Hansard, C, cc. 801–03.

24 Ibid., cc. 924–25.

25 Reports to the Poor Law Board on the operation of the laws of settlement and removal of the poor [PP, 1850, XXVII].

26 Hansard, CVIII, cc. 471–79.

27 Ibid., cc. 1026–103 and 1189–264, 19 and 21 February.

28 24 July 1850, Commons, R. A. S. Adair, Poor Relief (Cities and Towns) Bill; 6 May 1851, Commons, Grantley Berkeley, Poor Rates — for an equalisation of Poor Rates throughout England and Wales, and subject to local government; 15 April 1853, Lords, Lord Berners, Poor Removal and Local Assessment Bill; 26 July, Commons, Apsley Pellatt, Poor Removal. In addition, numerous questions were put and petitions presented during this period (1850–54) as well as notices of Resolutions.

29 Op. cit., pp. 7–8, 75–76, 84–86, 197, 202, 223, 515–18.

30 Hansard, CXXX, cc. 443–84.

31 The Times, 11 and 13 February; Morning Post, 13 February.

32 Hansard, CXXXI, cc. 1274–336, 24 March.

33 Ibid., cc. 1353–71, 27 March.

34 Ibid., CXXXII, cc. 72–75.

35 Ibid., cc. 1184–85.

36 Ibid., CXLI, cc. 309–14.

37 Observations on the Laws of Settlement, Poor Removals and the Equalisation of Poor Rates, etc. (1855); Address from the Association to the Ratepayers, etc. (1857); The Poor Laws — as they are and as they ought to be (1861). Its range of interest had widened, as shown by its change of title, which had now become “Metropolitan and County Association for the Equalisation of Poor Rates”.

38 The Times, 12 February, 14, 15, 20, 23 and 30 April, 5–8 and 25 May 1857.

39 Acton Smee Ayrton (1816–86) was a barrister; MP, 1857–74; Parliamentary Secretary to the Treasury, 1868–69; created Privy Councillor, 1869; First Commissioner of Works, 1869–73; Judge-Advocate-General, 1873.

40 Hansard, CXLV, cc. 1899–935, 16 June 1857.

41 J. Locke, ibid., CXLIX, c. 639, 23 March 1858.

42 Ibid., cc. 626–48, and CL, cc. 496–516, 23 March and 12 May.

43 Ibid., CLXI, cc. 236–39, 8 February 1861.

44 Charles Pelham Villiers (1802–98), grandson of the first Earl of Clarendon; secretary to the Master of the Rolls, 1830; Assistant Poor Law Commissioner, 1832–34; MP for Hull, 1835–98; Judge-Advocate-General, 1852–59; President of Poor Law Board, 1859–66.

45 London Illustrated News, 24 December 1842.

46 Manchester Times, quoted by Henderson, W. O., “Charles Pelham Villiers”, in: History, New Series, XXXVII (1952), p. 29.Google Scholar

47 9–10 Vict., c. 66, modified in 1847 and in 1848.

48 Hansard, CLXIV, cc. 28–30.

49 Villiers considered this pressure group sufficiently important to bring it to the notice of the House.

50 Letters on Irremovable Poor Bill from C. P. Villiers to Duke of Newcastle, July 1861, University of Nottingham, Department of Manuscripts.

51 Son of the Duke of Rutland.

52 Reference to Young England.

53 From its Committee stage, the Bill's progress in the Commons is reported in Hansard as follows: CLXIV, cc. 402–10, 799–800 and 967–76, 5, 9 and 16 July.

54 Villiers to Duke of Newcastle, ibid.

55 For example, Spitalfields 4/2½d in the pound, and the Minories 7½d St John's, Bedford, 2/1½d, and St Mary's, an adjoining parish, 4d. The Times, 8 March 1862, quoting Poor Law Board Report on Rating 1855–56.

56 Blake, R., Disraeli (London 1966), p. 464.Google Scholar

57 House of Lords Select Committee on Parochial Assessment [PP, 1850, LVI], q. 284.Google Scholar

58 Hansard, CLXVIII, c. 728, 24 July 1862.

59 Ibid., CLXVII, c. 1335, 3 July.

60 Ibid., CLXI, c. 151, 7 February 1861.

61 Ibid., CLXV, cc. 413–17, 17 February 1862.

62 Ibid., CLXVII, c. 1151.

63 The committee proceedings are set out in Hansard as follows: CLXVII, cc. 1330–35, CLXVIII, cc. 16–20, 234–40 and 344–48, 3, 8, 11 and 15 July.

64 Ibid., CLXVIII, cc. 728–31.

65 Report of Select Committee on Poor Relief [PP, 1864, IX].

66 Hansard reports on the Bill occupy 346 columns! References are as follows: CLXXVII, cc. 468–86, CLXXVIII, cc. 277–358, CLXXIX, cc. 116–73, 303–71, 491–525, 663–702 and 789–800, CLXXX, cc. 9–42, 351–57 and 524–26; 20 February, 27 March, 11, 15, 18, 22 and 25 may, 12, 16 and 20 june, respectively.

67 Caird was now MP for Stirling.

68 Lord Malmesbury had observed that the anomaly of the parochial system was acknowledged, its most glaring effects being that the proprietors of close rural parishes could and did transfer their poor population to neighbouring parishes, thereby reaping all the advantage of their labour when efficient, without the responsibility of their maintenance when unable to work. “I do not think”, he said, “I need make any observations upon close parishes. Your lordships are more aware than any other class of the community what they mean and how they work.” House of Lords Select Committee on Parochial Assessment, Minutes of Evidence, § 2399.

69 Over thirty years later, SirSimon, John, English Sanitary Institutions (London, 1897), p. 301Google Scholar, wrote: “In 1865 the pernicious influence, which we have shown exercised by certain Poor Law conditions, to deprive agricultural labourers of house-room in their place of employment was in great part removed by the passing of the Union Charge-ability Act.” In a footnote he added: “This Act was promoted by the Poor Law Board under the distinguished presidency of Mr. Charles Villiers. The evidence which the Medical Department had collected the previous year, on the house-accommodation of the rural labouring population, was a material part of Mr. Villiers' case, and was in consequence much attacked by those who opposed the Bill.”

70 SirEdmund's, influential article “The Law of Settlement”, in: Edinburgh Review, LXXXVII (1848)Google Scholar, was reprinted in 1865. It has been republished in Poverty in the Victorian Age, ed. by Coats, A. W. (Farnborough, 1973)Google Scholar, II: English Poor Laws 1834–1870.

71 In the course of defending the system of close parishes, he spoke ironically of the “weary and wayworn” labourer having to walk several miles to and from his work, and derided the pity one must feel for such a man as “simply twaddle”. The statement was received in the House with “Oh's” of dissent and earned Sir Rainald a rebuke in a leading article in The Times (29 March). In this connection, note a labourer's own words: “He had to get another place, but they would never let Jack gain a settlement; so in bad times Jack was sent to his own parish to find that his cottage was pulled down. He had to live miles away and tear his heart's blood out walking to and from his work night and morning.” J. T. Burgess, Life and Experiences of a Warwickshire Labourer, quoted in Ashby, A. W., One Hundred Years of Poor Law Administration in a Warwickshire Village (Oxford, 1912), pp. 79–80.Google Scholar

72 A similar manoeuvre had been attempted by the country party during the passage of the Irremovable Poor Bill in 1861“The country is not prepared at present, either for the total abolition of Removals or a great change in the Law of Settlement and the result has always been of proposing too much that nothing at all has been obtained. It is on this account, that you will hear by the opponents of the Bill, that their objection to it, is, that it does not go far enough! and that they desire to abolish Settlement altogether! which should be treated as it deserves, as a mere pretext by interested parties, to oppose a Bill that affects themselves and which they do not like!” Villiers to Duke of Newcastle, 21 July 1861.

73 Poor Relief (Metropolis) Bill (27–28 Vict., c. 116).

74 Equal in being based on rateable value, a principle introduced by the Irremovable Poor Act of 1861.

75 Metropolitan Poor Law Amendment Act (32–33 Vict., c. 63); Valuation Metropolis Act (id., c. 67); Metropolitan Poor Law Amendment Act (33–34 Vict., c. 18).

76 Thomas, J. A., The House of Commons, 1832–1901 (Cardiff, 1939).Google Scholar

77 Thomas, op. cit., p. 9.

78 Hansard, CVIII, c. 1026, 19 February. This implied that employers, from the motive of sheer philanthropy, were employing and paying men whose services were not really required.

79 Banks Stanhope, ibid., CLXXVIII, c. 300, 27 March.

80 Hunt, E. H., “Labour Productivity in English Agriculture, 1850–1914”, in: Economic History Review, Second Series, XX (1967), pp. 289–90.Google Scholar

81 Collins, E. J. T., “Harvest Technology and Labour Supply in Britain, 1790–1870” (unpublished Ph.D. thesis, University of Nottingham, 1970), p. 20.Google Scholar

82 Ibid., p. 23.

83 Hunt, loc. cit.

84 Young, G. M., Victorian England. Portrait of an Age, 2nd ed. (Oxford, 1953), p. 27.Google Scholar

85 Dunbabin, J. P. D., Rural Discontent in Nineteenth-Century Britain (London, 1974)Google Scholar, passim.

86 A. S. Ayrton, Hansard, CXLIX, cc. 626–34, 23 March 1858.

87 Alderman Sidney, MP for Stafford, referring to the pressure of recent distress, ibid., CLXI, cc. 240–42, 8 February 1861.

88 Annual Register, 1865, p. 124.Google Scholar

89 Hobsbawm, E. J., Industry and Empire (London, 1968), pp. 85–86.Google Scholar

90 By 1852 he had renounced the principle of protection. Disraeli's Reminiscences (London, 1975), p. 48.Google Scholar

91 Note Disraeli's description of him: “Henley […] sat […] with the countenance of an ill-conditioned Poor Law Guardian censured for some act of harshness. His black eyebrows which met, deeply knit; his crabbed countenance doubly morose; but no thought in the face, only ill temper”. Blake, Disraeli, op. cit., p. 304.

92 Briggs, Asa, The Age of Improvement (London, 1959), p. 428.Google Scholar

93 SirCook, Edward, Delane of The Times (London, 1916), p. 34.Google Scholar

94 The dates of these articles are as follows: 25 February, 28 and 29 March, 1 April, 12, 16, 20, 24 and 26 May, 13 June.

95 Hasbach, W., A History of the English Agricultural Labourer (London, 1920), p. 303.Google Scholar

96 SirClapham, John, An Economic History of Modern Britain, II (Cambridge, 1926), p. 509.Google Scholar

97 Horn, Pamela, Labouring Life in the Victorian Countryside (Dublin, 1976), p. 14.Google Scholar