other things, that they closed their doors, | Andover Committee was sitting in August, and permitted evidence to be taken, but that he was quite certain the end of Authat they did not submit that evidence to the gust would not have arrived before Mr. House of Commons. But his hon. Friend the Chadwick had kicked up such a disturbMember for Finsbury interrupted the hon. ance that the Commissioners would not Gentleman, and said that he himself had have been able to stand against it; or permoved that the evidence be laid on the haps the Commissioners felt, that if the Table of the House. Did the hon. Gen- inquiry was to be conducted in the same tleman vote on that occasion ?-did he vote manner as the Andover Committee, they for the Motion? [Mr. VILLIERS: I never would not be able to stand against it. And heard of it.] And yet the hon. Gentle- what was the charge against the Andover man now came forward and made those Committee? That they allowed the eviviolent accusations against those hon. Mem-dence taken before them to be printed. bers who devoted four months last summer The hon. Gentleman said, that that course to the investigation of this most intricate was at variance with the practice of Select subject; and when asked for proof of the Committees, and was liable to objection; most important part of his charge, said, he and, having had some experience in Comnever heard of the Motion of the hon. Mem-mittees, the hon. Gentleman said that those ber. But the hon. Gentleman, not con- Committees had refused to follow and tented with impugning the conduct and the hon. Gentleman here used some treconclusions of the Andover Committee, mendous epithet which he forgot the presaid not only that those conclusions were cedent of that Andover Committee. But not worthy of being listened to, but that did not the Free Trade Committee follow the evidence upon which they were ground- that example? Did not the Navigation ed was also unworthy of credit, for that those Laws Committee, of which the hon. Genunfortunate victims of a partial and unfair tleman was so active a Member, do the Committee were so baited and worried by same? [Mr. VILLIERS: They made rehis hon. Friends the Members for Wey-ports to the House.] Did the hon. Genmouth and Shrewsbury, and other hon. Members on the Committee, that they did not know what they said or did. A more astounding observation he had never heard. Let them conceive a gentleman like Mr. Cornwall Lewis, so utterly incapable of answering questions put to him by Members of that House, as to say things he did not mean or intend to say! He could not repose much confidence in such assertions. Then as to the question propounded by his hon. Friend the Member for Shrewsbury-fied by law and the custom of that House if Mr. Chadwick were that anguis in herbá he had been described to be-if he were deceiving and humbugging the Poor Law Commissioners-why was he maintained in his office? The hon. Gentleman said, it was not because he did so towards the present Poor Law Commissioners only, but that he had done the same towards all former Commissioners-that he was only continuing the same course of action, and was only maintained in his office, not because the Commissioners had any confidence in him, but because they and the Government knew that if he were dismissed, he would insist upon an inquiry; and the Commissioners thought they could not stand that inquiry. [Mr. VILLIERS: I never said so.] He would retract the words, but he must retain his argument. The hon. Gentleman said, although the tleman mean to say, that reports were not given in the morning papers? He believed that the same system of reporting was practised in the Andover Union Committee as in the Navigation Laws and other Committees; and if blame attached anywhere, it attached to the hon. Gentleman, who was not in his place to vote on the Motion respecting the evidence taken before that Committee. There was not one Member of that Committee but was justi in doing what he did. Then the hon. Gentleman made a most affecting appeal on behalf of the Commissioners, and said they were now suffering undeserved odium in the country, in consequence of the Andover Union Committee's report having placed upon their shoulders the iniquities perpetrated by the board of guardians of Andover. Was there ever so unfounded a statement? He defied the hon. Gentleman to bring forward one resolution of the Andover Union Committee which asserted any such charge. It was true that the Commissioners were unpopular with the country; but it was not true that anything that was said or done by the Andover Union Committee placed the cruelties that were perpetrated at Andover on the shoulders of the Commissioners, nor was it true that the country had any such belief. He Committee produced no other fruit that of had heard a great deal on this subject, | and he could safely say that he had never heard the Commissioners accused of having introduced, tolerated, or sanctioned the cruelties perpetrated by the Andover Union. But the most impressive part of the hon. Gentleman's speech, to his ear, was that in which he deprecated the habit, which he said some hon. Gentleman had fallen into, of attacking the rich and the aristocracy whenever an opportunity occurred for doing so. Recollecting the former speeches of the hon. Gentleman himself, and that long and unscrupulous course of agitation in which he had persevered, he confessed that he had heard those sentiments with some degree of surprise, though certainly with some degree of pleasure as well. His great astonishment was that the hon. Gentleman did not find his indignation excited by the attempts of hon. Gentlemen, either in or out of that House, to bring all power into disrepute unless it was embodied in the Poor Law. If the hon. Gentleman had taken the course he was now taking ear-to-who wished to see justice done to the lier, and had called upon his supporters not to indulge in attacks on the rich and the aristocracy, then he should have said that the hon. Gentleman was consistent in his present course, and he should not have been surprised at his making those violent attacks upon every one who did not fall down and worship the Poor Law Commissioners. Then the hon. Gentleman attacked his hon. Friend the Member for Weymouth in language as strong as any he had ever heard used in that House. There was no sneer in which the hon. Gentleman had not indulged. The quiet demeanour of his hon. Friend would, he should have thought, have shielded him from such attacks; but it seemed, on the contrary, only to invite them. The hon. Gentleman turned round to the place where his hon. Friend was not, and said, "He create public opinion! He create an influence! Does he flatter himself that he can do anything of the kind?" His hon. Friend was more correct than the hon. Gentleman, and he might congratulate his hon. Friend for having successfully attracted public attention to the great injustice and great wrong perpetrated by those in high authority upon those who had rendered them faithful services in subordinate capacities, but who, the moment they seemed to fail in rendering successful services to their superiors, were discarded without a moment's thought or consideration. If the Andover Union poor-should oppose the Bill, as it would defeat the very object for which it was intended. To those portions of the Bill which the noble Lord at the head of the Government seemed to think would be productive of more humane and tolerable regulations than existed at present, he would have no objection; but, for the life of him, he could not conceive how the addition of three or four high Government officers, whose time was already taken up so that they did not know which way to turn, could add to the practical efficiency of the present system. He did not think it would operate in any other way than by giving to the declaration of the Poor Law Commissioners the weight and sanction of a higher power. He knew his right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer was willing to undertake any amount of work that could be imposed upon him; but he must venture to doubt, even with his great capacity for business, his ability to give anything like satisfactory attention to the meetings of the Poor Law Commissioners "Cum tot sustineas et tanta negotia solus." The President of the Poor Law Commission was to be superior, not merely to the Commissioners, but even to the President of the Council, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, and to the Secretary of State for the Home Department. At the meetings, who could entertain a doubt but that his opinion and those of his two Secretaries | to take the earliest opportunity of saying would be taken for granted by the other that I entirely agree with him in thinking Members, who would be too much occupied that the first duty of property is to mainwith other matters to investigate into each matter that would come before them. No hon. Member would say that, in point of fact, the decision of the President and the two Secretaries would not be binding upon the other Members of the Commission. Nor could any one believe that the new Commission would give the slightest real administrative power to those great officials whose names and authority would only fortify and screen it. It was because he thought that the change would not be for the practical efficiency and thorough management of the Board-because he thought the present system would undergo through it no beneficial change-because he did not think the poor of this country would be placed in a more satisfactory condition, but would be left just where they were --because the hopes and expectations which had been raised as to the Amendment of the present system would be disappointed -and because none of the evils of the present law were remedied, and because, in short, this Bill only gave a new lease of power to a system that had broken down under the present Poor Law Commissioners, that he felt bound to give his vote against the second reading. tain the poor. There is no form in which I have not repeated that opinion in this House. It is one of our most binding and important duties to take care that no policy whatever shall at any time interfere with a due provision for the poor, and with their interest and their happiness, rightly understood. I have frequently avowed my conviction that the sound and just principle upon which to legislate for the poor, is to shape your measures for their relief so that they may be rendered conducive to the interests of the moral, the industrious, and the provident labourer, as contradistinguished from the idle and the improvident. Before the great change that within our recollection was made in the Poor Law, the principles which I have just now stated were distinctly and unreservedly avowed, and upon those principles the Bill of 1834 was founded. But I have been told that that measure has been a signal failure. Upon that question I am perfectly willing to join issue; I have shown, and I am prepared again to show, that the objects of that measure have been accomplished. In the first place, I beg to remind the House that one of its objects was to substitute union aid for parochial assistance; that SIR J. GRAHAM: I am not by any principle has been established. The semeans surprised at the impatience of the cond object of the measure I may thus House, and I had ventured to hope that it enunciate: whereas the Act of Elizabeth, would never again have become necessary partly from some deficiency in the nature for me to trespass upon the time or indul- of the statute itself, and partly from the gence of hon. Members for the purpose of new and false principles acted upon for the taking any share in a Poor Law debate; first time in 1796, gave occasion for but I trust when the House considers the complaints that able-bodied labourers who part which it was my duty to take in could not find work were not provided framing and passing the Bill of 1834- with labour at the cost of the parishes; when likewise they consider the obloquy one of the objects of the Bill of 1834 was which I have incurred on account of to establish the workhouses upon such a this law when I myself also consider basis as that they should be rendered a the bias which my former official posi- test of destitution. That workhouse test tion might be supposed to have given has been brought into operation, and I apto my mind and when I recollect also prehend that its practical effect has been the independent position which I now oc- successful. I do not think that any decupy in this House, and which enables me nial of that proposition can be in any calmly and dispassionately to review the manner successfully established; the test operation of a measure which, under other has been complete-destitution is relieved circumstances, I might be thought to re-habitual idleness receives no encouragegard too favourably-I say, that with these considerations present to my mind, it will not be thought unfitting that I should shortly address the House upon the question at present before us. do not know whether the hon. Member for Finsbury is now in his place, but I am anxious ment. What is the next question with which we have to deal? It had for a long time become well known that the parish officers generally performed their duty in a negligent and perfunctory manner. We considered that in future we ought to possess a set of officers whose duties should be clearly prescribed-paid officers, whose other point to which I now seek to direct conduct should be strictly watched, and the attention of the House, is the imperfect whose functions would, therefore, probably manner in which parochial accounts were be more efficiently performed than by those formerly audited. The manner in which who preceeded them in conducting the that department was neglected led to pracpractical working of the Poor Law. I tices which gave rise to the grossest frauds; feel that I am warranted in saying, that and the country possessed no means of corthat object also has been accomplished. recting those abuses till a change in the The next point to which our attention old Poor Law was carried into effect. But has been directed is the medical atten- now we have established a perfect system dance on the poor. Let us remember of auditing by means of responsible and what has been said on that subject. I am independent officers, who strictly watch the sure the sort of relief given in the shape whole expenditure. These then, I think, of medical attendance before the year 1834 are the principal heads upon which this is sufficiently in the recollection of every measure has been attacked; and I deny one now present, to enable me, by a mere that upon any one of these it has failed reference to the fact, to contrast that spe- -on the contrary, it has in each case cies of relief with the medical aid given proved eminently successful. I contend under the Bill of 1834; and I challenge a that upon every head which I have enumecomparison of the one with the other. rated, I have established the fact of entire I venture, without hesitation to affirm success. Upon other points -- especially that in no respect could the medical at- with respect to the allowance system, the tendance under the old law bear a con- noble Lord at the head of the Government trast with that which has been supplied addressed the House at so much length and under the new. This proposition I con- with so much ability, that it becomes unceive to be perfectly incontestable, and necessary for me to say more than that I so much has already been said with respect share his opinions-the old allowance systo it, that it is needless to waste another tem was fatal to the happiness of the poor; moment in seeking to establish an undis-it operated as a premium upon laxity of moputed position. The Bill of 1834 not only rals; it was a premium upon idleness, a concorrected the original evil, but also other dition which degraded the honest and indeabuses which sprung from the appoint-pendent labourer; it was a premium on ments being given to those medical men premature marriages; it placed the idle who came forward as the lowest bidders, have been subsequently removed. The old plan did not afford adequate and necessary control; and, as every one might have expected, the insufficient remuneration formerly given to medical attendants laid a just foundation for those complaints of which the House has from time to time heard so much. The neglect of the children of the poor in workhouses was amongst the subjects which formed a just ground of discontent under the old law. Under the arrangements more recently made-ar-cussion of measures of minute detail; and rangements which have received the sanc- he assumed that we should infallibly be tion of the House-effectual provision has occupied day after day with questions been made for the proper education and touching the soup in the workhouses, the training of the children in the workhouses. quality and quantity of the gruel given to the They have been placed under the direc-poor, the proportions of milk and water, the tion of masters appointed from normal schools; and I undertake to say, that whoever goes to the trouble of examining into the evidence on that subject will find, that in the matter of education the interests of the poor have been most amply and efficiently provided for; and that, upon the subject of instruction and discipline, there exist no just grounds of complaint. An and the improvident on the same footing with the most skilful and the best conducted amongst the poor. The endeavours which we have made to correct this vicious system, have been, I repeat it, perfectly effectual; and I ascribe that success to the efficient system adopted by the authority and under the control of the Poor Law Commissioners. The hon. Member for Finsbury said, he feared this House would be degraded into a sort of parish vestry, or board of guardians, by the perpetual dis bread and cheese, and other details of that degrading kind, which, although they are most important items in the comfort of the poor, are not subjects fit to be considered in this House. Now, if it were a question whether this be the right place to discuss questions of this kind, I might perhaps deprecate the introduction of such a measure; but have we not, in reference to the measure of 1834, had questions of this now, after many years' experience, the noble sort pressed upon us almost daily by those Lord proposes to us to take, and which I who persisted in striving at a sort of spu- now entirely approve; but that, at the rious popularity by forcing questions of instance of others, after weighing the matthis kind on our attention, and at a great ter carefully, he surrendered his judgdisadvantage to the authorities for the ment, and made the responsibility to elucidation of the real practice, from the this House not direct, but indirect. I absence of individuals who were directly must repeat, that the result of the exand immediately responsible? Nothing perience of the last ten years convinces could be more just than the description me that Lord Althorp's original opinion given by the right hon. Baronet at the was well founded, and that it would have head of the Home Department on this been better had the responsibility been branch of the subject; and if any illustra- direct to this House in the first instance, tion of the truth of his remarks were by an officer here representing the departwanted, it was afforded on the night he ment; and further, that less inconvenimade his speech. A question was asked ence would arise from the discussion of as to the dismissal of Mr. Mott. The these minute details in his presence than right hon. Baronet, speaking from the in- in his absence. But I wish to observe, formation he had received, used the ex- that the hon. Member for Finsbury stated pression, "The dismissal of Mr. Mott.' that he did not object to boards of guarNow, in a penal and technical sense, that dians; that he was disposed to trust those expression was an error. Mr. Mott, as I boards much more than Commissioners; explained the other night, was not "dis- but, not having the opportunity of remissed;" but, on a reduction of the num- ferring to the debate which was quoted ber of the Poor Law Commissioners, by by the hon. Member for Wolverhampton, Act of Parliament, viz., from ten to nine, my memory convinces me that the hon. it was on the whole thought expedient that Member for Finsbury has changed his he should retire. He was not, however, opinion in a very important item. Until dismissed on account of misconduct. [Mr. the present debate, I always heard him FERRAND: You used the word "dismissal" say that the local authorities are not to be yourself.] The hon. Member for Knares- trusted-that they have too deep an inborough relies on an expression of mine. I terest in cutting down the allowances to repeat that the Secretary of State, not the poor-that there is a danger of too knowing all the minute particulars of each rigid parsimony on their part—and that a case, is not the proper channel of commu- supervision on the part of a central aunication with this House. It is a mode of thority is salutary in the highest degree. communication at second hand, and must That brings me to the question really bebe always unsatisfactory. Sir, it is not fore us for discussion. First, is the central desirable, nor would it be possible, to use authority necessary? and next, if it be concealment as to the present state of this admitted to be necessary, has the adminisquestion. I say, deciding from my past tration of that central control hitherto been experience of what has been the operation imperfect? and if so, does this measure of that just and natural jealousy of this supply a remedy? As to the first branch, House, considering the vast powers of the it appears to me I have pointed out great Commissioners, and the imperfect nature and striking instances where a central auof their responsibility, this popular assem- thority is advantageous; and many Genbly, when conceding great powers to public tlemen on the bench below me, who are officers, is justly jealous of those powers, opposed to this measure, have admitted and seeks to put its finger on the officer that it is necessary to have some central who has committed a wrong, when it sus- control, and no one more pointedly than pects error. The noble Lord (Lord J. the hon. Member for Dorsetshire. Russell) with great frankness told us what hon. Member for Finsbury argues that, took place with the colleagues of Lord Grey under the system of relief now established, when the measure of 1834 was framed; the poor of this country are confined in and he states that Lord Althorp-that gaols, as he calls it-though I am rather great authority in judgment, in constitu- surprised that he should have used the tional feeling, and in real attachment to all term after the speech of the hon. and the principles of popular control as exercised learned Member for Bath on a former by this assembly-Lord Althorp wished, in evening, who read him a lecture on this the first instance, to take the course which point, which he may well remember; but The |