Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 19.djvu/496

Rh 47(5 POOR LAWS Work- Admission to a workhouse may be by a written order of the house board of guardians, or by the master or matron (or in their absence rules. by the porter) without an order in any case of sudden or urgent necessity, or provisionally by a relieving officer, or overseer, or churchwarden. Any person who is brought by a policeman as having been found wandering in a state of destitution may be admitted. It is to be observed generally, with respect to all per sons who may apply for admission into the workhouse under circumstances of urgent necessity, that their destitution, coupled with the fact of being within the union or parish, entitles them to relief, altogether independently of their settlement (see below), if they have one, which is a matter for subsequent inquiry. The regulations for the government of workhouses fall under two classes: (1) those which are necessary for the maintenance of good order in any building in which considerable numbers of persons of both sexes and of different ages reside ; (2) those which are necessary in order that these establishments may not be alms- honses, but workhouses in the proper meaning of the term. The inmates of a workhouse are necessarily separated into certain classes. In no well-managed institution of this sort, in any country, are males and females, the old and the young, the healthy and the sick, indiscriminately mixed together. The general classification of paupers in the workhouse so far as the structure admits is as follows: Class 1, men infirm through age or any other cause; Class 2, able-bodied men, ami youths above the age of fifteen ; Class 3, boys above the age of seven and under fifteen ; Class 4, women infirm through age or any other cause ; Class 5, able-bodied women, and girls above fifteen ; Class 6, girls above seven and under fifteen ; Class 7, children under seven. To each class is assigned that ward or separate building and yard which may be best fitted for the reception of such class, and each class is without communication with those of any other class. Guardians are re quired to divide the paupers into the seven classes, and to subdivide any one or more of these classes in any manner which may be advis able, and which the internal arrangements of the workhouse admit; and the guardians are required from time to time, after consulting the medical officer, to make necessary arrangements with regard to persons labouring under any disease of body or mind, and, so far as circumstances permit, to subdivide any of the enumerated classes with reference to the moral character or behaviour or the previous habits of the inmates, or to such other grounds as may seem ex pedient. For example, it is very desirable that females of dissolute and disorderly habits should be separated from those of a good character, for it is the duty of the guardians to take all reasonable care that the morals of persons admitted into the house be not corrupted by intercourse with inmates of this description ; but this has reference to continued ill-conduct, and is not in any way to be a punishment for offences committed previous to entrance into the workhouse and discontinued before admission. The separation of married couples was long a vexed question, the evils on the one hand arising from the former unrestricted practice being very great, while on the other hand the separation of old couples was felt as a great hardship, and by express statutory pro vision in 1847 husband and wife, both being above the age of sixty, received into a workhouse cannot be compelled to live separate and apart from each other (10 & 11 Viet. c. 109, 23). This exemption was carried somewhat further by contemporaneous orders of the board, under which guardians were not compelled to separate infirm couples, provided they had a sleeping apartment separate from that of other paupers ; and in 1876 guardians were empowered, at their discretion, to permit husband and wife where either of them is in firm, sick, or disabled by any injury, or above sixty years of age, to live together, but every such case must be reported to the local government board (39 & 40 Viet. c. 61, 10). Children under seven are placed in such of the wards appropriated to female paupers as may be deemed expedient, and their mothers are permitted to have access to them at all reasonable times ; fathers or mothers who may be desirous of seeing any child who is in the same workhouse have a daily interview ; and arrangements are made for permitting members of the same family who are in different work houses of the union to have occasional interviews with each other at such times and in such manner as best suits the discipline of the several workhouses. Casual and poor wayfarers admitted by the master and matron are kept in a separate ward and dieted and set to work in such manner as the guardians by resolution direct ; and whenever any vagrants or mendicants are received into a workhouse they ought (as a precaution necessary for preventing the introduction of infec tious or contagious diseases) to be kept entirely separate from the other inmates, unless their stay exceeds a single night. The guardians may direct that any pauper inmate of the work house of any class, except casual paupers, shall be detained in the workhouse after giving notice to quit it, for limited periods. A casual pauper (that is, any destitute wayfarer or wanderer applying for or receiving relief) is not entitled to discharge himself from a casual ward before 9 A.M. of the second day following his admission, or of the fourth day if lie has been previously admitted more than once within a month, nor before he has performed the work prescribed for him (Casual Poor Act, 1882). Infirmaries are attached to many workhouses, especially in the metropolis, and also in some cases there are infirmaries for the poor distinct from the workhouse ; all are governed and regulated under the orders of a central board. The outdoor labour test order of the local government board Outdoor directs that every able-bodied male pauper who may receive relief relid within the union out of the workhouse shall be relieved in the following manner : half at least of the relief given to such pauper shall be given in food, clothing, and other articles of necessity, and no such pauper shall receive relief from the guardians of the union or any of their officers or any overseer while he is employed for wages or other hire or remuneration by any person ; but every such pauper shall be set to work by the guardians. The kind of work is reported to the board. A departure from the order is, however, per mitted if approved by the board. To prevent the practice formerly prevailing in some parts whereby the poor rates were used for the payment of rents directly to the landlords, the guardians and parish officers are prohibited from paying the rent of the house or lodging of any pauper, or applying any relief in such payment directly or indirectly. This does not apply, however, to any shelter or temporary lodging procured in any case of sudden and urgent necessity, or mental imbecility; nor does it prevent the guardians, in regulating the amount of relief to be afforded to any particular person, from considering the expense to be incurred in providing lodging. This allows of supplying to the pauper the means of paying for a lodging instead of requiring him to come into the workhouse in such exceptional cases. Modern remedial legislation and public efforts connected with improved dwellings for labourers and artisans, as well as for the poor generally, are distinct from the laws for the compulsory relief of the poor, although, like education, the whole subject of ameliora tion of classes admits in some of its aspects of being viewed together. The allotment of land to industrious poor has been also of great service (Allotments Extension Act, 1882). Guardians having greater provision for the reception of poor children in their workhouse than they require may with the con sent of the board contract with the guardians of any other union or parish for the reception, maintenance, and instruction of any poor children under sixteen being orphans or deserted by their parents or whose parents consent (14 & 15 Viet. c. 105 ; 29 & 30 Viet. c. 113). A consolidated order comprising workhouse regulations Educat prescribes that the boys and girls who are inmates of a antl workhouse shall, for three of the working hours at least * c every day, be instructed in reading, writing, arithmetic, and the principles of the Christian religion, and such other instruction shall be imparted to them as may fit them for service, and train them to habits of usefulness, industry, and virtue. In relation to education of poor children out of the workhouse there has been much legislation. To go no farther back, the Act of 1855, providing for the education of children in the receipt of outdoor relief (18 & 19 Viet, c. 34, known as Denison s Act), was superseded in 1873 by the Elementary Education Act of that year (36 & 37 Viet. c. 86), containing a special clause for the education of children relieved out of the workhouse and the pay ment of school fees, but this clause was in turn repealed by the Elementary Education Act, 1876 (39 & 40 Viet. c. 79), making it the duty of every parent to cause a child to receive efficient elementary instruction in reading, writing, and arithmetic. See EDUCATION. By this Act a provision substituted for that of 1873 enacts that where relief out of the workhouse is given by the guardians or by their order by way of weekly or other continuing allowance to the parent of any child above the age of five years who has not reached the standard in read- j ing, writing, and arithmetic prescribed by a certain code, ! or who for the time being either is prohibited by the Act from being taken into full time employment, or who by any bye-law under the earlier Elementary Education Act of 1870 is required to attend school, it shall be a condi tion for the continuance of such relief to the parent or child that elementary education in reading, writing, and arithmetic shall be provided for such child, and the