NOTE.
In response to the canal and gipsy children’s prayers, cries, and tears, the only answer coming as yet is as follows: With the assistance of the Government, represented by the Right Hon. Sir Charles Dilke, M.P., President of the Local Government Board; the Right Hon. A. J. Mundella, M.P., Vice-President of the Committee of Council on Education; J. T. Hibbert, Esq., M.P., Parliamentary Secretary to the local Government Board, Mr. Burt, M.P., introduced the Canal Boats Act (1877, 46 Vict.) Amendment Bill on April 9th, 1883, and it was read the first time. When the Bill came on for the second reading on April 18th, Mr. Salt, M.P., for Stafford, met it with a “blocking” amendment as follows: “After the Second reading of the Canal Boats Act (1877) Amendment Bill, to move that it be referred to the Select Committee on Canals.” The Daily News in a leader states: “Mr. Salt intends to move that the Canal Boats Act (1877) Amendment Bill be referred to a Select Committee. The motion, if carried, would shelve this useful and unpretending Bill for another session.” I was in the Speaker’s gallery, and saw with sorrowful pangs Mr. Salt move his successful check to the Bill. This was no sooner done than Mr. P. A. Taylor, M.P. for Leicester, took his hat off to “scotch” the further progress of the Bill. Notwithstanding the entreaties of Earl Stanhope, Mr. W. E. Forster, M.P., Mr. Pell, M.P., myself and others, Mr. Salt refused to drop his “blocking” amendment, although Mr. Salt and Mr. Taylor knew full well that any amendment they might propose when the Bill is in Committee before the “House” would be considered. Later on Mr. Warton, M.P. for Bridport, put his universal block on, as he always does when measures for the country’s welfare come to the front and are likely to pass into law. In the week commencing April 30, 1883, no less than twenty-nine “blocks” had emanated from this “honourable member’s” brain to be placed against the legislative action of Parliament for the country’s good.
On Friday, April 27th, the Daily Telegraph, in a leader, states Mr. Algernon Egerton, M.P. for Wigan, has “blocked” the Canal Boats Act Amendment Bill brought forward by Mr. Burt on behalf of Mr. George Smith, of Coalville.
It seems inexplicable that Mr. Taylor, who, as a Member of the “House,” helped me to get the Brickyard Act of 1871 and the Canal Boats Act of 1877 passed, should at the last moment take steps to prevent the success of the Act of 1877 which my Amending Bill would bring about, and with but little cost or inconvenience to all parties. Both Mr. P. A. Taylor and Mr. Salt are friends to the cause I have in hand—at least I hope so; but to check the Bill was a backward move.
To turn aside the Christianizing and civilizing institutions of the country from exerting their influence upon 60,000 poor canal and gipsy children is no light undertaking. It cannot be the cause of the poor canal and gipsy children that they wish to throw cold water upon, but upon my unworthy self, who has had the audacity, against immense odds and under tremendous difficulties, to take the cause of the brickyard, canal, and gipsy children in hand. Time and patience weave trials into pleasures and difficulties into crowns.
In the meantime the children’s cries are going east, west, north, and south, upward and heavenward for help. Shall it be given? They are more in need of it by far than the children of other working classes. Oh, that a speedy answer may come, and the children delivered from the vortex of ruin and the jaws of death by the hand of the most enlighted Government in the world!
APPENDIX A.
MY PLANS EXPLAINED AND OBJECTIONS ANSWERED.
To illustrate more fully the plans I suggest for improving the condition of the canal, gipsy, and other travelling children, and to bring to the surface all the weak as well as the strong points which the working out might reveal, I cannot do better, I think, than introduce my readers to an imaginary large gathering of my friends, with a real object in hand, in one of the Committee rooms at the House of Commons, which list of friends, including Lord Aberdare, Lord Aberdeen, Lord Stanhope, Sir William V. Harcourt, M.P., Sir Richard A. Cross, M.P., Sir Charles Dilke, M.P., Mr. W. E. Forster, M.P., Mr. J. T. Hibbert, M.P., Mr. Mundella, M.P., Mr. Alexander McArthur, M.P., Mr. W. H. Wills, M.P., Mr. A. Pell, M.P., Mr. Salt, M.P., Mr. Thomas Burt, M.P., Mr. Frank A. Bevan, Mr. Edwin Lawrence, will be found in my previous works, and earlier in this, together with many other valuable friends and well-wishers to the cause of the poor neglected brickyard, canal, and gipsy children. Their names will ever be remembered and spoken of by me with the profoundest respect. They are names that stand high in the legislative, literary, press, philanthropic, social, and religious annals of our country, irrespective of creed, sect, or party; and nothing, had space been at my disposal, would have given me greater pleasure than that of showing my gratitude to them by placing all their names upon these pages. [339]
Question 1. “Would you explain to us more fully than you have done in your Congress papers and ‘Gipsy Life,’ the plans you refer to for bringing about an improvement in the condition of the gipsy and other travelling children?”
In the first place, as I have previously stated, all the vans and other temporary movable dwellings should be registered in a manner analogous to that provided under the Canal Boats Act of 1877. The certificate to be renewable annually at any of the Urban or Rural Sanitary Authorities in the country, the owner of the tent or van paying a sum of ten shillings per annum; to be equally divided between the local authorities and the Local Government Board.