[527]. A Health Centre and Dental Clinic in a Rural District, Newport, Essex, 1911, p. 6.
[528]. "Charity and Food," report of a Special Committee of the Charity Organisation Society, 1887, p. 16. For later expressions of the same line of criticism, see, for instance, "The Relief of School Children," by M. Clutton and E. Neville (C.O.S. Occasional Paper), March, 1901, pp. 4, 6; "Underfed School Children," by Arthur Clay (C.O.S. Occasional Paper), May, 1905, p. 3; "The Feeding of School Children," by Miss McKnight, in Charity Organisation Review, July, 1906, p. 37; "A New Poor Law for Children," by Rev. H. Iselin, in Charity Organisation Review, March, 1909, p. 170.
[529]. "Working-Class Households in Reading," by Professor A. L. Bowley, in The Journal of the Royal Statistical Society, June, 1913, p. 686. The minimum standard for food was computed by Mr. Rowntree, in 1901, as 3s. for an adult, and 2s. 3d. for a child. This standard has been raised by Professor Bowley to 3s. 6d. and 2s. 7d. respectively, since prices in Reading in 1912 were about sixteen per cent. higher than at York in 1901. The diet on which Mr. Rowntree based his computations was mainly vegetarian, and his minimum standard assumed a knowledge of food values and perfectly scientific expenditure. (Ibid., p. 684.) Taking a slightly different standard, Professor Bowley computes that "more than half the working-class children of Reading, during some part of their first fourteen years, live in households where the standard of life in question is not attained." (Ibid., p. 692.)
[530]. Ibid., p. 693.
[531]. The figures for Birmingham are taken from The Public Feeding of Elementary School Children, by Phyllis D. Winder, 1913, pp. 47-55; those for St. George's-in-the-East, from "The Story of a Children's Care Committee," by Rev. H. Iselin, in Economic Review, January, 1912, p. 47; those for Stoke, Bradford, St. Pancras and Bermondsey from case papers that we have analysed. These figures must not be taken as more than a somewhat rough indication of the state of affairs, for it is not always easy to determine precisely into which category a particular case should be put. Probably the proportion of casually employed is somewhat understated; of the twenty-six, for instance, who are classed as unemployed at Birmingham, roughly one-third belonged to the class of permanent casuals, but were totally unemployed at the date of the enquiry. (The Public Feeding of Elementary School Children, p. 48.)
[532]. We may note that there are very few cases where the fathers of the children who are receiving school meals are, at the time, in regular work. (See table on page [211].) Many authorities refuse to consider such cases, while, where they are not necessarily barred, they amount as a rule, so far as we have found, except at Bradford, to a very small proportion of the total number of cases dealt with. In London a few committees have several such cases on their feeding-lists—a member of one committee, indeed, informed us that the fact that a man had a large family and low wages was, till recently, taken as a reason for granting meals to his children—but the great majority of committees either refuse to feed such children at all, or only do so in infrequent and exceptional circumstances. One or two instances were quoted to us where, as it was alleged, the provision of meals for the children had induced the father to acquiesce in the acceptance of a low wage without demanding an increase or seeking more remunerative employment. Thus we were told of a man who was formerly in charge of two furnaces at a wage of 24s. a week; one furnace was shut down, and he was offered the charge of the remaining one at 15s. This he accepted and the Care Committee had been feeding his children for a whole year. In another case, a man who was out of work, and was having all his children fed at school, took a job at 15s. a week, a wage which, it was asserted, he would not otherwise have agreed to. But in such instances, infrequent and isolated as they are in any case, it is often found on analysis that the father, through some physical or mental infirmity, is incapable of performing a man's work, and unable, therefore, to earn more wages.
[533]. At Bradford a few years ago an enquiry was made with the object of discovering how far parents were obtaining the meals under false pretences. Two criteria were taken, firstly, whether the parents' statements as to the income earned were corroborated by their employers; secondly, how far the parents voluntarily withdrew their children from the school meals when their circumstances improved. As a result of this enquiry it appeared that not more than 2-1/2 per cent. were unduly taking advantage of the meals. In many cases, where the parents' statements as to income did not tally with the employers' statements, it was found that the parents, in giving their average earnings, had overstated instead of understating them.
[534]. Report of Chief Medical Officer of the Board of Education for 1910, p. 1.
[535]. Report of Select Committee on Education (Provision of Meals) Bills (England and Scotland), 1906, Qs. 2290, 2312. (The italics are mine.)