Poor Laws Flashcards
What did the speenhamland system do…
Relief given to able-bodied poor by linking it to the price of bread.
Widely used in south and east of England
Date of Speenhamland system
1795
Elizabethan poor law of…
1601
Why was the Elizabethan poor law an important step away from earlier poor laws?
Abandoned the more obvious sorts of repression in favour of ‘assistance’ and ‘correction’
Impotent poor (sick/old/infirm/mentally ill) were to be looked after in poorhouses/almshouses
Able-bodied poor who wanted relief - set work in a ‘workhouse’ while they continued to live at home
Those who refused were to be punished in a ‘house of correction’
Pauper children - apprenticed to a trade so that they could support themselves when older
The Elizabethan poor law stated that…
A person claiming relief HAD to be RETURNED to the place of their BIRTH in order to receive it.
If their birthplace was unknown they would be sent to a place they had lived for a year or more, or to the LAST parish through which the person had passed without getting into trouble.
Why did settlement statement cause problems?
Parish overseers wanted to keep their own poor rate as low as possible, as they struggled to stop paupers from becoming a charge on their particular parish
The settlement law of 1662 tried to clarify matters by…
Legal settlement was by birth, marriage, apprenticeship or inheritance.
So, for any individual claiming relief, the responsible parish could be the anyone of which the above states.
Why was settlement legislation tightened up in 1697?
To bar strangers from entering a parish and finding work there unless they could produce a settlement certificate issued by their home parish - statin they would be taken back and given relief there should they become needy
How were the settlement laws designed?
To control a migrant population and at the same time ensure that the burden of providing for the poor did not overwhelm some parishes.
However, they were never applied consistently over time or place to place.
They did not stop a mobile population creating the growing cities of the late 18th and early 19th centuries
Why was the division of ‘houses’: poorhouses for impotent poor, workhouses for able-bodied poor and ‘houses of correction’ for the idle - never effective?
It was not cost-effective for each parish to provide for paupers in this way
1834 over 900 parishes had joined to form 67 unions, most of which employed a paid relieving officer - section 29 stated that no one was sent to the poorhouse except children, the aged or infirm
The overseers were required to…
Find work for the able-bodied who needed relief
Why did parishes continue to provide outdoor relief for their able-bodied poor?
It was easy to administer and could be applied flexibly
E.g. Cyclical unemployment might cause only short-term distress and long-term provision of relief in a poorhouse/workhouse would not be appropriate
What different solution did the parishes develop?
The Speenhamland system
The labour rate
The roundsman system
Why was the Speenhamland system widely used?
It was a way of providing relief by subsidising low wages and as such it was not new.
Difference? It establish a formal relationship between the bread price and the number of dependants in a family.
When was the Speenhamland system implemented?
1795
Why did the Speenhamland system struggle to cope?
Widely used in south and east of Britain at the beginning of the 19th century
It was rarely used in the north
The system was never given legal backing, although some politicians tried and it was often abandoned or modified out of all recognition as overseers struggled to cope with changing economic conditions
Why was the labour rate a different way of providing relief?
Overseers did not directly top up low pay
Instead they levied a parish rate to cover the relief of the able-bodied poor, as usual, and then set a wage for each unemployed labourer.
(Labour rate)
Ratepayers who employed these labourers, and at the rate set by the parish were…
Exempt from paying poor rates into the general fund.
The roundsman system was a common variant on the labour rate.
Able-bodied pauper labourers were sent round the parish until thy puns a…
Parish ratepayer to employ them.
How did the pauper get paid?
Paid a wage by the ratepayer agreed with the overseer and the parish overseer made up the rest from the poor rate
Roundsman system often called a…
‘Billet’/’ticket’ system by locals
Why was the rohndsman system called a ‘ticket’ system?
The overseer would sign a ‘ticket’ for the pauper to take to a potential employer, authorising the pauper to work under the parish relief system.
When the work was completed, the pauper would return the ‘ticket’ to the overseer, signed by the employer to show that the work had been done and a wage paid
The difference would then be made up by the overseer
How did the roundsman system vary?
In some parishes this would be based on the price of bread and the size of a pauper’s family; in other parishes, a flat rate would be paid
What did all these interpretations and modifications of the Elizabethan poor law have in common?
They were genuine attempts to deal with the worst effects of poverty.
It reflected a tradition by which the MORE POWERFUL sections of society took on RESPONSIBILITY for the welfare of the MOST VULNERABLE.
The old poor law was regarded by the poor themselves as an..
Essential safety net - they had a right to access and from which they had a right to benefit.
