Increasing powers for local government

Increasing powers for local government

After the Reform Act 1867 there was increasing welfare legislation. As this legislation required local authorities' support the Poor Law Board was replaced with a Local Government Board in 1871. County Councils were formed in 1888, District Councils in 1894.


This meant that public housing, unlike health and income maintenance, developed outside the scope of the Poor Law. The infirmaries and the workhouses remained the responsibility of the Guardians until 1930. This change was in part due to changing attitudes on the nature and causes of poverty - there was for the first time an attitude that society had a responsibility to protect its more vulnerable members.


Demise and abolition

The reforms of the Liberal Government 1906-14 (see Liberal reforms) made several provisions to provide social services without the stigma of the Poor Law, including Old age pensions and National Insurance, and from that period fewer people were covered by the system. Means tests were developed during the inter-war period, not as part of the Poor Law, but as part of the attempt to offer relief that was not affected by the stigma of pauperism.


One aspect of the Poor Law that continued to cause resentment was that the burden of poor relief was not shared equally by rich and poor areas but, rather, fell most heavily on those areas in which poverty was at its worst. This was a central issue in the Poplar Rates Rebellion led by George Lansbury and others in 1921.
Workhouses were officially abolished by the Local Government Act 1929, which from 1 April 1930 abolished the Unions and transferred their responsibilities to the county councils and county boroughs. Some however persisted into the 1940s. The remaining responsibility for the Poor Law was given to local authorities before final abolition in 1948.