LIVING ON DOLE

Wairarapa Times-Age, 21 April 1939, Page 9

LIVING ON DOLE

WASTE OF HUMAN LIFE AN URGENT PROBLEM. PARALYSING MALAISE SPREADS. A new storm is blowing up over our British dole arrangements (unemployment assistance), and high time, too, states Sir Ronald Davison in "The Spectator.” Ido not refer to the family means test, which since 1935 has been much mitigated, but to the paralysing malaise which is spreading unchecked and untreated among growing numbers; of men who have settled down for life on an unconditional dole and have lost all interest in trying to earn a wage for themselves and their families. This indictment is limited; it does not apply to the great majority of our unemployed citizens, three-quarters of whom only draw short spells of benefits or assistance for genuine involuntary unemployment. The trouble lies with a venal minority who have succumbed to the temptations of the too mechanical system of allowances, a system which has grown steadily worse since the Unemployment Assistance Board took charge in 1935.

Let me remind readers that for over 500,000 unemployed men and women who fail on stamps to qualify for insurance benefit or are disallowed for some fault we have' a national dole called unemployment assistance. Nowadays the payments under the latter “needs” scheme usually exceed benefit rates, especially for married men. They are given without limit of time and there is no penalty for refusing suitable jobs, voluntary leaving, or reject tion of an offer of training at Government expense. As it now works, the U.A.B. possesses, or at any rate applies, no ultimate sanctions. Nothing/is done with the hard cases; restorative methods are at a discount and there are no work centres.

PERPETUAL MAINTENANCE. Human nature, or a part of it, cannot stand the strain of such an easygoing offer of perpetual maintenance by the State. History has proved in the past and we are proving again today that such a system is bound to lead to abuse and harm. The cancer only affects a minority, but that minority is not small, and has been growing for three years. There are today in our cities about 200,000 unemployed people (my own estimate) who are being demoralised and allowed to deteriorate. They need something more than an arithmetically calculated dole paid out to them punctually each week for years on end without any condition as to training, rehabilitation, or self-help Not fewer than 100,000 of these unhappy people are young men under 35 years of age, a third of whom are already irretrievably damaged. Here lies the core of the disease; the older men over 50 are a less urgent human problem. Sir Ronald here quotes several cases he describes as typical, in which young men under 30, some of whom have married under the dole or have families of up to six children. These men have done no work for years, made no effort to find it, and actually refused when offered, he continues. In some London districts it seems evident that over 30 per cent of the younger clients under 30 have settled down to live on the U.A.B. Yet London and many other cities have since 1936 been places where any active young man can get jobs, not necessarily permanent jobs, but at least enough to keep him off the Exchange for six months in the year. On Merseyside the position is worse in every respect. Liverpool has long been a dark patch on the national map of poverty and pauperism. Today there are at least 2000 young workless men in that area who are now verging on the unemployable. To describe these men as “a class” is misleading; each one has a different case history behind him which needs to be discovered. But certain general features are common in their records. They start in blind alleys at 14 and drift from job to job, learning nothing. At 18 they are down and out. In a year or two they marry and bring children into the world, thereby “earning” much larger unemployment money. The longest periods of unemployment are found among the families all of whose working members have long records of unemployment. There is a real family tradition of unemployment, singling them out from their neighbours. Very few read the papers or are politically minded. These men and youths will join no organisation, not even the unemployed clubs and centres. To all intents they have dropped out of community life. For years past our British unemployment services have, in their main features, been the best in the world, but can it be denied that the cases quoted (and they are typical of many thousands) are bringing discredit upon a part of our system? It is not merely the waste of public money but waste of human lives that is at stake. How is this insidious evil in our midst to be checked? We know, of course, that the long-term remedy is to see that our young workers have better parents and better start in the industrial world, but we cannot afford to wait for that. As an immediate policy the case for some stiffening in our dole administration is unanswerable. The U.A.B. must face up to apply, with discretion, some dose of compulsion. Work centres of different types are long overdue and attendance at them must be made a condition of payments. Welfare work of many kinds has been neglected, and there is a grave lack of co-ordination between the U.A.B. and the various local poverty services which should be brought to bear on the bad cases. If some of the provisions of the Unemployment Assistance Act are short-sighted, ina-’ dequate, and ill-conceived, and I think they are, then they should be amended. Much more could be said on the con- ' structive side of this problem, but it cannot be said here. My purpose has been to proclaim the disease rather ■’ than to prescribe the cure. Political ' opinion is, I believe, far too complacent i or timid on the whole matter at pre- ’ sent.