This Bill is intended to replace the Bill which was sent from the Seanad to the Dail. In my opinion it is a much worse Bill than the Bill which was passed by the Seanad, and it will in fact, in my view, be very difficult to consent to its adoption in its present form. I realise that there is a certain risk in not passing the Bill, but, frankly, I am very doubtful whether it would not be more beneficial to risk the non-passing of the Bill than to pass it without amendment. So far from merely doing what the Seanad decided upon doing, that is to say, to bring the city and county of Dublin into line with the rest of the country in respect to the legality of relief for able-bodied persons outside workhouses, the Bill re-enacts in specific terms some of the most obnoxious provisions of the old poor law. Those of us who have been interested in this question will remember that there was a Commission set up in 1906, of which a Senator, Sir Edward Bigger, was a member. That Commission made special reference in its report to the work of an earlier Commission, an Irish Commission set up and consisting mainly of Irishmen in 1836, and which clearly reported in a direction which was a contrary to the prevailing view regarding the poor law in England, and contrasted in its report between the state of things in England which the English poor law was adopted to remedy and the state of things in Ireland. The Irish Commission reported quite clearly in specific terms that the conditions were very different, and implied in its report that the law which might be considered to be requisite in England at that time was not applicable to Ireland, but the Government of the time decided in favour of applying the English poor law system to Irish conditions, and passed a Bill in 1838 adopting the English poor law system for Ireland quite in the face of every exponent of what was desirable and necessary, and in the teeth of the recommendations of the Irish Commission. Some of the provisions of that obnoxious Poor Law Act, which everyone interested in poor law reform in this country has denounced, have been inserted in this Bill.
I take special exception to the reintroduction of the words "destitute poor person." In Section 2 boards of guardians may relieve outside the workhouses any destitute poor person who could not heretofore have been relieved by them. I think it is true to say that there has been, even before the adoption of the county schemes, a gradual getting away from the insistence upon destitution as a condition of relief. Under the Medical Charities Act in practice throughout the country, but not everywhere to the same degree, insistance upon destitution has not been made necessary. We are now asked in this Bill to re-enact in specific terms the obnoxious words "destitute poor person." What is the effect of that? It is that the relieving officer, whatever he may have done in the past for the relief of persons who are not destitute, must now see—for the Dáil and Seanad have re-enacted it—that destitution must be a condition of relief, which may mean in practice that the man or woman who has a few sticks of furniture in the house or a few pictures will have to sell them, if they are saleable, before he can get relief. It was the practice for many long years that a person who had any saleable goods could not receive poor law relief. We are asked in this Act to re-enact these very words, which is an indication to the relieving officer that unless he can satisfy himself the applicant for relief is destitute he may legally refuse to give relief. I think that is a great blot in the Bill. I hope the Minister will embody in the Bill such amendments as will bring the law in Dublin into line with the rest of the country, that is to say, that a person eligible for relief would be a person who is unable by his own industry or other lawful means to provide for himself and his dependents the necessaries of life, or medical or surgical treatment. That is a very great difference, and unless the Minister tells me in so many words that this Bill cannot become law this year unless it is enacted without amendment I shall certainly attempt to amend it in the direction I have indicated.
I think that Section 4 is dangerous, and may be used in a sense which is not intended by the Bill. It enables boards of guardians to use the poor law for purposes which are no doubt not intended by the Bill, but would be distinctly obnoxious to the general community—I mean that where a board of guardians is empowered to enter into any work of public utility on behalf of any person or public authority, the board may become public contractors employing persons in receipt of relief to do work of any kind for anybody, provided that it can be brought within the term of "public utility." A public utility is not defined. There is a very wide range of operations which may come under that term, "public utility," which, if the guardians were to enter upon, would well be treated as being in competition with private industry, and in fact merely be the substitution of a man who was out for a man who was in, not relieving employment to any extent and not touching the problem.
In fact, Section 4, to my mind, appears to be an attempt to tackle the problem of unemployment from the standpoint of poor law, which is an entirely wrong way to tackle the problem. There has been a good deal of agitation on other aspects of this Bill as far as it affects Dublin, and I must say that the agitation sounds very false and empty to me. I have had, as I presume every other Senator has had, this morning a circular letter containing certain provisions of what the circular states is an agreed Bill passing through the British Parliament in regard to settlement—the transfer of persons from one part of the country to their native place. It would appear from the circular issued from the Chamber of Commerce that this is some new proposal which has been generally agreed upon in England, and, therefore, should be accepted in Ireland, but the authors of the circular do not appear to appreciate the fact that the Bill that is now being discussed by a Joint Committee of the House of Commons and the House of Lords is a Bill for consolidating the existing Acts. It is for the exclusive purpose of the consolidation of the existing Acts of Parliament. This consolidation process is merely preparatory to the introduction of new legislation. What the Chamber of Commerce seeks to suggest as something new is merely, in fact, re-enacting in a consolidated form what has been the practice in England and Wales for probably 60 or 70 years.
In any case, conditions in England and Wales are very different indeed from conditions in this country and the provisions regarding settlement in England are clearly intended to deal with vagrants. The problem we are dealing with is not the problem of vagrancy. It is the problem of men who would normally be working if employment were available, but who owing to continuous disability arising from unemployment, are unable to maintain themselves and their families in decency, and in respect of the other Section—the sick, the disabled and the unfit—we desire that they should be relieved outside the workhouse where they can be—and they usually can—more cheaply relieved than inside the institution. This is not a problem of vagrancy at all and, therefore, the circular of the Chamber of Commerce has really no effect with regard to conditions in this country. I hope that the Minister will be able to give us some assurances that he is prepared to modify the form of this Bill in respect of this question of destitution, and also that he will agree to insert in the Bill, if he can give us some assurance that it is likely to be considered by the Dáil, that no person eligible for relief shall be relieved in any institution provided or maintained by the Board of Guardians, unless he can be relieved effectively in such institution at less cost than in any other lawful way. Both these provisions that I have spoken of are already the law in every other part of the country except Dublin county and city, and inasmuch as they have been embodied in every scheme for the rest of the country I think they may reasonably be embodied in this Bill, so long as there is an intention to enlarge on the simple proposition contained in the Bill sent from the Seanad to the Dáil. Having extended to some extent the proposals of the Seanad Bill I am hopeful that the Minister will agree, at least, to embody these two portions of the general scheme of Poor Law in the Bill which is to apply to Dublin.