OUR HOSPITAL AND CHARITABLE AID INSTITUTIONS.

Te Aroha News, Volume VI, Issue 281, 14 July 1888, Page 4

OUR HOSPITAL AND CHARITABLE AID INSTITUTIONS.

Wellington. July 11. In his annual report on the hospitals and charitable institutions of the colony, Dr. jVlacGregor goesexhuusthely into the work' ing of the present syslem, which he condemns unreservedly, selecting the Thames and Liokitika hoo^italo as typical of the manner in which the question of out-door hospital work and the general pioblem of chaiitable aid aro merged together. Regarding the former institution he slioavn that the annual outlay on salaiies alone is CB6B, and says that the trustee 1 -, have thrown open the out-door department of the hospital to all persons whatsoever whether rich or poor, who are willing to pay five shillings per week for advice and medicine. The result is that the general body of the taxpayer of \>he colony have thiongh the Government .subsidy to contribute towards giving cheap medical advice to the Thames people by enabling the trustees to undersell local medical men by the competition of salaiicd officers, and by the same means lownrds injuring the druggists and undermining the selt-respect of the people. During 'lBB7 there were treated on these terms 1,339 in dividual patients, with 3,357 attendances. In order to leave Dr. Williams free to overtake this rapidly-mci easing demand for his services on the.«,> feinis, the trustee* de&ire to relieve him of all cha i table aid viork which they want the local doctois, whom they are starving out, to undertake. The Inspector deals at length with the present system of outdoor relief, and strongly condemns it, as being opposed to the first principles, in that it violates the law of nature— kC He who will not or cannot work, neither shall he eat :" and, secondly, it does not obey the law on which human society is based, which says, " Love thy neighbour as thyself." All our existing machinery therefore is simply a devipe by which a goneral tax is made to relieve us of a duty laid upon us individually, and it is a devico foredoomed to failure. To stop it at all costs is clearly our duty, and in its stead the State must,

without regard to desert, provide baro subsistence, and no move, under a rigid workhouse test, whose principle must be that no State pauper can bo better treated than tho poorest of tho poople Avho are taxed to support him. Old people who, through no fault of their own, have become objects of charity and have no friends ; widows with young children, each case of which must be treated onitsownmeiitsunder the kindly eye ot a judicious and discriminating visitor; cases of temporary lack ot employment or sickness; and persons who are convalescent, should be taken in hand by a Charity Organisation Society in each oi our centres. The third class contains all those where the poverty and consequent suffering of innocent vivea and children arises from iramoi ality and misconduct on the paitoftho bi cad- winner ; descried wives, who may have driven away their husbands by neglect or misconduct, or wheio the husband dc-urts the wife knowing that sho will be butter oil' in his absence, or where the two iaoy be in collusion, be working at a distance while she and tlv; tuYnily got say £1 a-weck and her reno — these and all similar cases recmiro the most constant and vigilant oversight dining tho time they are in receipt oi aid, and nothing but a voluntaiy oigarnsation ot charitable persons can do any good in dealing with them Fortheihst class the State mu&t pio\ide in each centic, or near it, a workhoufe, managed under the most stringent provisions. For the second and third classes what is needed is a Charity Organisation society, that shall bring to a iocub all the existing benevolent agencies in our large cowns, so as to provide against overlapping The Inspector believes that if twenty philantlnopio i idies and gentlemen in each of oui towns were to baud ohemselves togcHier on tho model of the societies ol London and New York, they could reduce by more than hall the money that is ucing spent mainly m pauperising the people, and at the «arne time provide adequate assistance to all deceiving cases Jt is not yob too late to stamp out the pauper class that has arisen among us owing to our own apathetic folly in dealing with it, and as the State cannot do tins, the Inspector is ceitain ohat a Charity Organisation .Society in each ot oui laige ccnties can do it it taken in hand now . How tar such a society ought to be established, and from what sources, is a mattei or public policy.