pace with the cost of public assistance. But, after all, to many the real question is not the cost but the increase of dependence.
The Able-bodied.
Their proposals in regard to the able-bodied provide for a Minister for Labour, who is to "organise industry" and provide work for as many as possible, and to maintain honourably the remainder. The principal instrument which is to be used in the organisation of industry is the labour exchange, from which all employers of casual labour are to be compelled to hire their labour, though labourers will not be compelled to register unless they become in some way chargeable to the public authority. It will be the duty of the superintendent of the labour exchange to "dovetail" casual work—that is to say, that instead of giving two days' work apiece to A, B, and C, he will give six days' work to one of them at his discretion; at least there is nothing to show how he is to decide between them, and a wide door is opened to favouritism. The other two will be ousted altogether from the labour market, and will have to be maintained. They become "the surplus of labour." "We cannot," say the Minority, "avoid the conclusion that there is this surplus of labour."
Surplus Labour.
This argument of "surplus labour" was used with constant iteration against the reformers of 1834. If we turn to the Majority Report (Part III., sections 442-445) we shall find how it was met by them, and how their arguments were justified by the eventual absorption of this supposed "surplus"
