Labourers' Act, they are also given, in substantial measure, as regards housing. Is the policy of giving them in that regard on the whole desirable? This is our final problem.
Before this question can be discussed satisfactorily, it is necessary to clear the ground of an important and widely prevalent misconception. Popular writers often imply that the experience of the old Poor Law has condemned once and for all every form of public assistance to poor persons, except such as is given under disciplinary and deterrent conditions. The provision from national funds, whether in whole or in part, of education, of insurance premiums, or of housing accommodation, is denounced on the ground that it constitutes relief in aid of wages and is, therefore, a reversion to the discredited policy of Speenhamland. This is a mistaken view. It ignores the fact that the root evil of the old Poor Law lay in the circumstance that the subsidies which it granted depended directly upon, and varied inversely with, the wages paid to the recipient, thus creating a
