Our endeavour has been to raise the total income of each individual
to at least two shillings or two shillings and sixpence a week. Now,
I am told that this is a very inadequate amount, and no doubt it is
an amount very far below that which many of the recipients were in
the habit of obtaining. But in the first place, I think there is
some misapprehension when we speak of the sum of two shillings a
week. If anybody supposes that two shillings a week is the maximum
to each individual, he will be greatly mistaken. Two shillings a
head per week is the sum we endeavoured to arrive at as the average
receipt of every man, woman, and child receiving assistance;
consequently, a man and his wife with a family of three or four
small children would receive, not two shillings, but ten or twelve
shillings from the fund--an amount not far short of that which in
prosperous times an honest and industrious labourer in other parts
of the country would obtain for the maintenance of his family. I am
not in the least afraid that, if we had fixed the amount at four
shillings or five shillings per head, such is the liberality of the
country, we should not have had sufficient means of doing so.
Pages:
243
244
245
246
247
248
249
250
251
252
253
254
255
256
257
258
259
260
261
262
263
264
265
266
267