[109] Circular Letter, 14th December 1852, in Fifth Annual Report of Poor Law Board, 1852, p. 31.
[110] Special Report on the Further Amendment of the Poor Law, 1839, p. 72.
It should be said that (with an exception to be hereafter noted in the case of women) the Central Authority stood rigidly on the position taken up by the 1834 Report that no regard was to be paid to character, in judging applications for relief. "If a person," said the Poor Law Commissioners in 1840, "be in a state of destitution, such person is to be relieved, without reference to the moral character of such person. Relief from the poor rates can only lawfully be given in cases where persons are destitute of the means of support. And the fact that the destitution may have been caused by the immorality or improvidence of the party who seeks to be relieved does not alter or vary the duty of guardians to administer relief proportional to the necessity of the case."[111]
[111] Poor Law Commissioners to Plymouth Board of Guardians, 25th April 1840.
The outdoor relief, where given, had to be subject to two conditions. It was to be at least half in kind, and conditional on the recipient being set to work by the local authority, the time, mode and conditions of work being fixed by the Central Authority.
With regard to the kinds and conditions of "parish work," it was repeatedly laid down by the Central Authority that none would be sanctioned unless (_a_) the work was "hard," not of a kind usually performed by independent labourers or competing with them, nor "much regarded as to profitable results," strictly supervised, "of a laborious and undesirable nature in itself," and "of such a nature as to discourage applications from all who are not really necessitous"; (_b_) paid "less than would be paid for work of equal quantity if performed by independent labourers";[112] or as it was later stated, the payment "ought to assume the form of relief, not of wages.... A single man or a man with a wife and one child ought not to receive as much as a man with a wife and eight children."[113]
[112] p. 45 of Second Annual Report, 1836; _Official Circular_, No. 29, p. 151, 30th November 1843.
It is not explained how payment on the last principle could be made consistent with the former principles. But the intention of the Central Authority is clear. In the words quoted with approval in the circular of 1835, the parish was to be "the hardest taskmaster and the worst pay-master."[114]