I've been a Gipsying / or, Rambles among our Gipsies and their children in their tents and vans

by George Smith

Question 22. “You say in your Canal Boats Act Amendment Bill, and you want the principle extended to vans, that no child or young person should be allowed to work for either hire or profit on Sundays. Would not this be rather hard upon poverty?”

The law prohibits children and young persons being employed in other occupations, and there is no earthly reason why the poor travelling children should toil seven days a week. I claim that if children employed all-week in light healthy work are exempted from Sunday labour, then most surely children tramping the country in vans should have the same right. In Section 21 Clause 3 of the Factory and Workshop Act, 1878, 41 Vict. ch. 16, it is laid down that “a child, young person, or woman shall not be employed in a factory or workshop” with some exceptions; so you will see that I do not go so far as the Section I have quoted does, although the travelling children need the protection more.

Question 23. “How would you do in the case of boats conveying perishable goods?”

The boats should be worked by adults as fly boats are.

Question. 24. “Do you not think that your plan would interfere too much with the liberty of Englishmen? Ought not a traveller to be allowed to live where he likes and how he likes?”

Yes: providing it were good for the nation and everybody did the same. My plan would not interfere with the liberty of the gipsies and other travellers nearly so much as the law already interferes with the liberties of others of her Majesty’s subjects. People living in ships, houses, palaces, cellars, barracks, cabs, coaches, and carriages have to conform to healthy rules and sanitary requirements. I knew a case of a travelling house conveying small-pox to a large town and causing more than 2,000 deaths. I have known over and over again of cases where infectious diseases have been carried through the country by means of canal boats and vans. Only the other day a man, wife, and five children came to our door with an old tumbledown pony and rickety waggon. The little box upon the top of the waggon, used as “sleeping apartments” for the whole of the family, would not be seventy cubic feet of space. Even in this little crib the five children were all ill of a highly infectious disease, which they were carrying through the country. The two main influences I want to bring to bear upon the little travellers and their homes are the universally acknowledged social laws for elevating those living in the gutter, viz., education and sanitation. With the thorough application of these to little gipsies I shall be satisfied, and then the children will have made the first step in a gradual improvement, leading them to Christianity and civilization, so that they shall be strong enough in brain and muscle to turn the world upside down and downside up. I want the road to school made easier than the road to jail, and I would prefer seeing the sanitary inspector and School Board officer walk into the gipsy vans than either the policeman or the doctor.

Question 25. “How do you propose carrying out the Act? Would you leave the matter entirely in the hands of the local authorities?”

I propose that the registration and local inspection should be done by the local authorities in the town or places through which the vans passed or stayed, as the case might be. I do not think that it would be wise to place the actual working out of the plans I propose in the hands of the Local Government Board. The Local Government Board should only be called upon to appoint one or two Inspectors to visit the fairs and other places occasionally to see that the local authorities properly carried out the Act. I recommend the same course in the “Canal Boats Act Amendment Bill.”

Question 26. “How would you propose paying the Government Inspectors? Would their salaries be an increased charge upon the Treasury?”

No: the Inspectors would not cost the country one farthing, as the profits arising from the 5s. stamped registration certificates would more than pay the Government for their expenses of supervision; and the other 5s., together with the fines, would satisfy the local authorities.