3.3

Question 1

Elizabethan poor law 1601

Answer 1

• parish set poor rate and determined wether eligible and how much
• parish used unpaid, non professional administrators

Question 2

administering poor law

Answer 2

• paid officals in large towns
• setting work was up to churchwardens and overseers of the poor (e.g farmers - those who had to pay poor rate)
• argued to be more humane as locals would know better what each other needed
• also had opportunity for tyrannical behaviour from overseeres
• local crisis e.g poor harvest could put immense burden on locally raised finances

Question 3

Catogerisation of the poor

Answer 3

• implemented in attempt to bring some consistency
• writers and reformers regarded poverty as inevitable and neccessary e.g only through fear of poverty would people work
• ‘indigence’ was wrong -> poor laws never attempted to stop poverty but to force poor people to work to stop more indigence
• 19th century ‘deserving’ (old, sick children) and ‘undeserving’ (drunkenness) poor
• all help to undeserving contained elements of punishment
• fears poor may be attracted to idle life

Question 4

When was the settlement act?

Answer 4

1662

Question 5

Aims of the settlement act

Answer 5

clarify existing problems with settlement under elizabethan poor laws

Question 6

Achievements of settlement act 1662

Answer 6

• legal settlement by birth, marriage, apprentaship
• 1667 further tightened, strangers could not work without settlement certificate
• designed to ensure burden of providing for poor was not too much for parish

Question 7

Limitations of the settlement act

Answer 7

• most strangers left alone until tried to claim relief -> 1795 removal act
• prevented paupers who did not have legal settlement from getting help
• overseeres manipulated the system
• lots of arguments between parishes who wanted to keep their poor rate low
• hated and evaded by paupers

Question 8

Overall impact of settlement act

Answer 8

• genuine attempt to provide every person with a cleary defined legal settlement
• clear criteria for removal and settlement
• ineffective as corrupt and hated
• could not manage a mobile population/keep up with the issuing and carrying out of settlement orders

Question 9

Outdoor relief

Answer 9

• able bodied paupers in their own homes
• easy and flexible e.g breadwinner ill or cyclical unenemployment
• new outdoor relief systems needed after 1750 due to industralisation
• bad harvests and strain of napeolonic wars bought poor law to breaking point

Question 10

When was the speenhamlands system?

Answer 10

1795

Question 11

Aims of speenhamlands

Answer 11

• provide relief by subsidising low wages
• use price of bread and number of dependants in family

Question 12

Achievements of speenhamlands

Answer 12

• most widley used

Question 13

Limitations of speenhamlands

Answer 13

• some took each child into consideration but some only took into account once over a certain number
• did not always give cash, some flour

Question 14

Overall impacts of speenhamlands

Answer 14

• widley adopted over south and east
• seasonal unemployment been exacerbated by the loss of cottage industries and lack of avalibility of allotments to grow own and loss of common land (enclosure) = hamper success
• never given legal backing despite attempts

Question 15

Aim of Roundsman system

Answer 15

method for work to be found in parishes where there are too many paupers for work avaliable

Question 16

method of the roundsman system

Answer 16

• gave each pauper a ticket for an employer authorising them to work under the parish
• when returned with signed ticket, parish make up the difference between wage from poor rates

Question 17

Limitations of the roundsman system

Answer 17

• farmers took advantage as they did not have to pay set wages

Question 18

Aims of the labour rate

Answer 18

provide relief that avoided problems of roundsman

Question 19

Sucess of labour rate

Answer 19

• established a labour rate and usual poor rate across parishes
• ratepayers who employed pauper and paid them at the rate set did not have to pay poor rates
• prevented the abuse of roundsman
• 1832 one in five parishes used

Question 20

Elizabethan indoor relief system

Answer 20

• poorhouses, workhouses and houses of correction
• impotent poor to be in poorhouses, able bodied poor in workhouses and those who refused in houses of correction
• however did not work in practise and was not cost effective
• many realised needed to find a more cost effective way e.g some already combined
• outdoor relief remained most common

Question 21

When was the Gilberts act

Answer 21

1782

Question 22

What was the aim of the gilberts act

Answer 22

• aid the struggling administrative system of relief -> soldiers and sailors after american war, enclosure created long term unemployment and pressure on urban cities from industrialisation

Question 23

Achievements of the gilberts act

Answer 23

• parishes could combine in poor law unions to build and maintain workhouses
• required to submit reports of poor law expenditure
• ministers and churchwardens required to provide information about local charities
• able bodied excluded from workhouses, only impotent
• parish guardian had to find work for able-bodied, if not then outdoor relief provided

Question 24

Limitations of gilberts act

Answer 24

• permissive despite attempts to make mandatory

Question 25

Overall impact of Gilberts act

Answer 25

• parishes were slow to adopt and not forced to
• 1834 (new poor law), 924 parishes combined into 67 unions
• all unions in rural areas of midlands, south east and east

Question 26

When were the Sturges-Bourne acts

Answer 26

1818 and 1819

Question 27

Aims of S-B

Answer 27

tie landowners, gentry and upper class more firmly into administration of poor relief

Question 28

Successes of S-B

Answer 28

• elected men to parish select vestries to be responsible for local administration
• distinguished between deserving and undeserving poor to decide relief
• 1825, 46 select vestries had been formed and reported a significant drop in cost of relief
• national reduction in cost after first year = 9%

Question 29

Limitations of S-B

Answer 29

• permissive and only applied to parishes who voted to adopt
• reduction is cost wouldve been at the expense of the destitute

Question 30

Less eligibility and workhouse test

Answer 30

• paupers should fear the workhouses
• conditions inside had to be less desierable than outside
• Lowe policy ‘less eligibility’
• workhouse test = only genuine destitue would accept relief on these terms
• children, old, sick and disabled exempt from test as deemed deserving

Question 31

When were the Napelonic war with France

Answer 31

1783-1815

Question 32

Impact of the war

Answer 32

• led to greater demands for poor relief
• pressure of poor law
• almost bought state to collapse

Question 33

Impact of the war on harvests

Answer 33

• 1813 and 1814
• harvests good
• cheap foreign corn could be imported from europe = forces farmers to keep prices low
• had to pay wartime taxes and intrests to cover costs of enclosures
• many went bankrupt = unemployment for labourers
• forced to claim relief
• those who lasted had to pay labourers less = push to pauperism

Question 34

How did the Tory gov try to improve in 1815

Answer 34

• corn laws to protect british farmers = not allowed import of foreign corn until british corn reached 80 shillings a quater
• many resented the corn laws as believed kept price of bread too high = riots as poor could not afford bread

Question 35

Impact of post-war distress

Answer 35

• more people than ever claiming relief
• began to view relief as a right
• returning soldiers, dislocation of trade and poor harvests made situation
• radical protests exacerbated forcing gov to suspend habeas corpus and introduce the six acts
• forced the gov to be repressive = unlikely to legislate any help to relief
• 1817 report condemned Poor law for creating poverty

Question 36

When were the swing riots?

Answer 36

1830

Question 37

Aims of swing riots

Answer 37

• higher wages
  removal of the steam-powered thresing machienes that created cyclical unemployment = forcing them into poverty

Question 38

Successes of swing riots

Answer 38

• village in sussex demanded higher allowances -> frightened gentry who agreed to demands
• revealed pent up greviances against changes in farming and harsh poor relief policies
• forced authorities to deal with problem
• created a political climate in parliament where poor law reforms were becoming more likely

Question 39

Events of the swing riots

Answer 39

• Hampshire - broke threshing machines and pulled down workhouses
• Wiltshire violently targeted MP, who drew harsh allowance for poor relief
• petitions and threats signed

Question 40

Regional differnces - Nottinghamshire

Answer 40

• fifth most industralised country in Britain = relatively prosperous
• knitting industry and alternate industries for when less rural employment
• 1820-23 expenditure of relief less than 11 shillings - well below average
• Rev Becher driving force behind amalgamtion go 49 parishes into a large union -> emphasis on kindness and education for children
• Rev Lowe wanted outdoor relief abolsihed and make WH a place of fear
• Nicholls saw allowance systems as responsible for the continuation of poverty

Question 41

Regional differences - Gloucestershire

Answer 41

• 1830 Lloyd Baker started reforming poor law administration
• used an allowance system
• introduced rigirous reforms and in two years number of paupers fell from 977 to 125
• abolsihed outdoor relief and made WH so dreadful only desperate would go
• similar policies in Cornwall and Derbyshire

Question 42

Regional differences - Berkshire

Answer 42

• gave able-bodied lower rate than normal
• removed 63 long-term recipients
• London, Bristol, Norwich similar

Question 43

Similarities in regional differences

Answer 43

• all trying to lower cost of poor rates
• reduce pauperism

Question 44

Thomas Malthus (1766-1834)

Answer 44

• economist specalised in demography
• argued population would outstrip all avaliable food supplies
• poor law made situation worse as encouraged poor to have more children to claim more relief
• favoured abolition of the poor law = force to keep families small as no finacial advantage and wages would rise as poor rate no more = everyone would prosper

Question 45

David Ricardo (1772-1823)

Answer 45

• political economist agreeing with Malthus
• wrote on the principles of political economy and taxation (1817)
• idea of iron law of wages and wage fund
• as less money avaliable for wages, people drawn into pauperism = draining wage fund
• only way to break cycle was to abolish poor laws

Question 46

Thomas Paine (1737-1809)

Answer 46

• writer and republican
• criticsed poor law for being inadequate
• proposed property tax on very rich to use to support systems for the poor e.g family allowances, pensions
• believed able-bodied should go into workhouses before recieving relief

Question 47

Robert Owen

Answer 47

• radical factory owner
• blamed capitalist economic system for creating poverty
• built a community in his mill workers villages = no adult allowed to work 10.5hr+, sick pay, children had to be educated corporal punishment forbidden, sold goods to workers at cost price
• mills still had profit

Question 47

Influence of Utilitariansim

Answer 47

• developed by Bentham
• principle based on happiness
• had profound influence on the thinking of those developing new poor law
  believed:
• relief was a public responsibility and should be organised by central gov
• should be a gov minister responsible e.g looking at stats and WH
• all outdoor relief abolished and only relief given to those prepared to go to WH
• no discriminatioin between deserving and undeserving poor

Question 48

Why did the government take action in 1832?

Answer 48

• general election 1831 elected Whigs (favour of reform)
• general consensus amoung properited class that something had to be done about increasing cost
• 1832 announced a royal commission would be set up to investigate poor laws