Chapter 1 — Institute of Charity

Introduction

It is impossible, therefore, to assess the actual day-to-day costs of running the industrial schools. Mazars’ analysis of the capitation grant, by reference to Household Income and Unemployment Assistance, would indicate that funding was adequate for both schools in the 1940s and 1950s, although Upton would have been more financially challenged because of the fall of numbers in the early 1950s. In Ferryhouse, high numbers and a farm of good-quality land should have ensured a reasonably good basic standard of living for the boys.

Once numbers of residents began to fall in the 1960s, financial problems would have arisen and, indeed, this led to the closure of Upton in 1966. By the time the Kennedy Committee reported in 1970, the capitation grant as a system of funding, which depended on high rates of committals, was clearly inadequate, and alternatives had to be found. In the case of Ferryhouse, these alternatives were not finally put in place until the early 1980s, when an annual budget based on submitted estimates was agreed with the Department of Finance. During the 1970s, however, significant increases in the State grant alleviated the position for those institutions like Ferryhouse that continued to operate.