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The 1834 Poor Law Amendment Act
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The Poor Law began in 1601 during the time of Elizabeth I. The aims of the poor law, according to Golding and Middleton (1982:11) were work, discipline, deterrence and classification. The poor law was the most important policy development dealing with poverty up until the end of the nineteenth century and it was a development, which focused in particular upon control and deterrence. In 1834 the Poor Law Amendment Act was passed, it hoped to change some of the principles of the old poor law. Previously the parishes were too small and too poor a unit to support a workhouse so the parishes were required to group together into poor law unions, with workhouses to be built in every union. An elected board of guardians ran each union. This was hoped to be a more cost-effective way of providing care for the poor. Ratepayers in each union had to elect a Board of Guardians. Guardians were elected triennially; their job was to supervise the workhouses, to collect the poor rate and to send reports to the Central Poor Law Commission. This Central Poor Law Commission would be appointed by the government and would be responsible for supervising the Amendment Act throughout the country. Evans (1978:62) states, We recommend … the appointment of a Central Board to control the administration of the Poor Laws, with such assistant Commissioners as may be found requisite; and that the Commissioners be empowered and directed to frame and enforce regulations for the government of workhouses, and as to the nature and amount of the relief to be given and the labour to be exacted in them, and that such regulations shall, as far as may be practicable, be uniform throughout the country … So it was seen that local control led to inefficiency and corruption and so a centralised and uniform system was advocated. As a result control of the poor law was vested in the three-man Poor Law Commission based in London. The Poor Law Amendment Act also stated that no able-bodied person was to receive money or other help from the poor law authorities except in a workhouse. Burke (1987:21) states, One of the principles of the new poor law was the refusal of poor relief to the able-bodied. If an able bodied person had no means of support whatsoever he would no longer receive any form of outdoor relief from the parish, but would have to take himself and his family into the workhouse. This came to be known as the ‘all-or-nothing principle’ because the recipient either got total provision for himself and his family in the workhouse or nothing at all. Another principle of the poor law amendment act was to abolish out-door relief, like giving alms to the poor in return for their work. In the amendment act it was determined that external relief for the poor was to be stopped within two years leaving those who were poverty stricken with the choice of the workhouse or starvation. Despite this people where still offered out-door relief. Fraser (1984:51) states, Approximately five out of six received ‘outdoor’ relief in the middle of the nineteenth century. Blakemore (2003:44) states, Perhaps this was something to do with the fact that the workhouse test was never applied comprehensively because many local areas refused to build the number of workhouses envisaged in the original policy because of the costs involved. So then rose the problem of making the workhouses repellent to the poor.
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