[532] Circular of 14th November 1892, in Twenty-second Annual Report, 1892-3, p. 38.
[533] Circulars of 27th March and 30th September 1893, Twenty-third Annual Report, 1893-4, pp. lxiv-lxv; Board of Trade Report on Agencies and Methods for dealing with the Unemployed, 1893 (C. 7182), pp. 187-206.
[534] Twenty-fourth Annual Report, 1894-5, pp. lxxi-lxxiii. The local authorities were taking action before the Circular was sent; _see_, for instance, MS. Minutes, Bradford Board of Guardians, 4th February 1895, showing that they had decided on a deputation to the town council on 23rd January; and that the town council, on 25th January, had agreed to find work in clearing away snow.
[535] _Ibid._ p. lxxiii; First, Second, and Third Reports of the Select Committee on Distress from Want of Employment, 1895.
[536] Twenty-fourth Annual Report, 1894-5, p. lxxiv.
[537] Third Report of Select Committee on Distress from Want of Employment, 1895, p. 560.
[538] The Lord Mayor of Manchester, in reply to deputation from the Chorlton Board of Guardians, 1895; _see_ Second Report of Committee on Distress from Want of Employment, 1895, p. 54.
[539] Third Report of Committee on Distress from Want of Employment, 1895, p. v. The Committee also recommended the abolition of the penalty of disfranchisement, on persons in receipt of poor relief, so far as "the deserving man forced to become dependent on public aid" was concerned (_Ibid._).
[540] _Ibid._ p. iv. _See_ Mr. Shaw Lefevre's answer in House of Commons 18th February 1895 (_Hansard_, vol. 30, p. 969). The Central Authority persisted in its attitude with regard to these powers, and the rules, without which they cannot be used, have not in fact been issued; _see_ Mr. Gerald Balfour's answer in House of Commons, 19th July 1905 (_Hansard_, vol. 149, pp. 1179-80). Similar powers were, however, granted to distress committees of local municipal authorities by the Unemployed Workmen Act 1905, under which the necessary rules have been issued.
Finally we come, with regard to the relief of the section of the able-bodied who may be deemed to be "the unemployed," to Mr. Long's scheme, embodied in the Unemployed Workmen Act of 1905, under which distress committees of the local municipal councils, formed partly of members nominated by the boards of guardians, are empowered to make special provision for those of the able-bodied who are "unemployed," without their becoming paupers, in the way of: (i.) emigration; (ii.) internal migration; (iii.) temporary employment; (iv.) farm colonies; or (v.) labour exchanges; at the expense, so far as emigration, migration, labour exchanges, and the cost of the whole machinery are concerned, of the local municipal rates, and, so far as the actual relief or wages is concerned, of voluntary subscriptions or subventions from the National Exchequer.[541]