HOW THE LONDON POOR LIVE.

Gisborne Times, Volume XXIX, Issue 3300, 19 August 1911, Page 3

HOW THE LONDON POOR LIVE.

MRS. W. P. REEVES INVESTIGATES. ASTONISHING FIGURES. For the past two yars Mrs Pember Reeves, of the Fabian Society executive Committee, and wife or Hon. W. Pember Reeves, for some time High Commissioner for New Zealand, and now director of the London School of Economics, has been conducting an important inquiry into the domestic life of the working classes. The investigation was prompted in the first instance by a gift of money to a small committee of which Mrs Pember Reeves is a membei, made- by a.-lady who desired to see whether a way could not be found to diminish- the high death rate among infants under one year. ' While engaged on this- task Mrs Reeves collected a great deal of valuable information. ... Each mother kept a “budget" for a pericd of at -least one year, showing exactly how much money .there was to be spent and the manner in which it was spent. This is taken down _ weekly by Mrs Reeves. The foll-oViner is a typical one. The husband ill this case earns 25s per week, of which sum he hands 23s to his wife. .For Mrs Reeves’s purpose the family is treated as seven persons, the baby being disregarded. Ln considering what . follows, however, the baby’s existence should not- be overRent, light, heat, clothing, cleaning, insurance, Us 2d ; 11s 6J; 11s 9|d; 11 s 0 5 Lis s|d f- 11s- -2-kl; 11s 4]d ; 10s l*d; LOs 3kl. Food allowance per head, Is Bid; Is 7£d; ls'7|d; ls7]d; I s ®i-d; Is 5,1 d. -- . "Average per head, during six weeks, for food, Is 7d. . . , In another* case, in which the tamiiy numbered seven, excluding the baby, the weekly income was 20s 9d, and trie average amount- spent on fcod per head was Is 2|d. When it was pointed orit that this allowance did not include fresh milk for the baby, Mrs Reeves exclaimed: “Fresh milk costs 4d per quart! A child of one year old needs at least one quart milk per day. means 2s 4d per week for that child for milk-alone It can’t be done. Anti what is done?” she was asked. condensed milk, potatoes, and bread! Ike ‘budget’ you have- just seen includes two tins of condensed milk of the thud quality. There is a label on each tin, 'Not Fit for Infants Food ! That is tlie milk on which the nation s babies are being, fed 1 One of the most urgent needs of to-day is an adequate and cheap milk simply! Our living stock will readilv decline, until we get.it. .1 have got w.ork for the elder girls in some of these families, but they are so anaemic and ill-conditioned through bad and insufficient feeding that they cannot keep it unless it is mere mechanical drudgery. When stinting has to- be done it is the wife and children who do it; as the women say, the husband a •trerrth must be kept to .enable aim to’work at all. lam astonished, concluded Mrs Reeves, “at the patience and perseverance of these women, ana the real decency and self-suppression o their husbands. ! They are surprisingly good to one another, but their vitali y is starved and cramped’ and their intelligence is dulled by sheer want of proper food from the time, they are horn. Remember, these are not the slum people-; they are the ordinary, respectable lower working class. It is a very largo class, and its persistent deterioration- must have a serious effe-c on the health of the nation!