4,228 entries for Finance

The unemployment figures were as low as they were because of the emigration of thousands of fathers, throughout the 1950s especially, and the fact that many do not feature in these figures because they were trying to eke out a living on smallholdings of land.

Despite the valuable work done by private philanthropic organisations, like the Saint Vincent de Paul19 or the Catholic Social Welfare Fund or such local charities as the Marrowbone Lane Samaritan Fund, Evening Herald Boot Fund, Belvedere News Boys’ Club, Rotarians or the Penny Dinners, the long-term problem was so great that only State support could ameliorate it.

At independence, systematic State assistance to poor people was confined to two relevant20 supports. The first of these were the unpopular workhouses, which had been established in each Poor Law Union. Immediately after independence, in 1922, these were reorganised so that, in each county, there was one central institution, under the control of a local board of health. Between 1913-14 and 1924-25, the numbers of people, including some young children, living in these institutions declined by one-third (from 27,000 to 18,000).

The second form of assistance was originally known as ‘outdoor relief’ (so called, by contrast with the workhouses). After independence, outdoor relief was renamed home assistance and restrictions on its payment to able-bodied persons or widows with a single child were dropped. As a result, between 1920 and 1925, the numbers receiving outdoor relief/home assistance increased from 15,000 to 22,000, which was still a very small figure having regard to the level of need, with total annual expenditure going from £114,000 to £373,000. The 1937-38 annual report of the Dublin branch of the NSPCC pointed out that while the rate of home assistance for Dublin was adequate at 25 shillings per week for a family of five children, rates prevailing elsewhere, specifically in Wicklow and Kildare, at a maximum payment of 10 shillings per week, were insufficient. Home assistance took the form not only of money but also food, clothing and bedding. Another form that home assistance might take – free or low-cost footwear – bears directly on committal to Industrial Schools: for, to take an example, during a three-month period in 1944, the Dublin Corporation School Attendance Committee dealt with 480 cases of non-attendance and, in at least 80 cases, the reason given was that the children had no footwear in which to attend school.21 In 1939 the unemployment figure was at 100,000, with over 83,000 people in receipt of home assistance, of whom one-third resided in Dublin City or County).

During the relevant period three further welfare benefits were instituted. The first of these, provided under the Unemployment Assistance Act 1933 was unemployment benefit, that is (means-tested) relief of able-bodied men and women, during periods of temporary unemployment. Before the 1933 Act, only a relatively small proportion of the population had been eligible for unemployment benefit which was funded mainly by social insurance. This meant that generally it was confined to better-off working people. The rest, including all agricultural workers and smallholders many of them unemployed in all but name, had to rely on home assistance or the occasional emergency relief provisions provided out of central funds during periods of severe unemployment.

Secondly, the Committee of Inquiry into Widows’ and Orphans’ Pensions (1932-33) made recommendations that bore fruit rather quickly, in the form of the Widows’ and Orphans’ Pension Act 1935. This established pensions, on a contributory basis, for widows and orphans of wage earners; and also, on a non-contributory basis, for anyone in need.

But most significant of all in the present context was the children’s allowance, which was introduced in 1944. At the start, when it was confined to the third and subsequent children under 16, it benefited 320,000 children. This was not means tested, and provided a regular allowance, initially at the rate of 2s 6d per week. Dr Kennedy summarises the subsequent extension of the children’s allowance:22 Children’s allowances were extended to the second qualified child in July 1952, and to all qualified children from November 1963. Under the Social Welfare Act, 1973, the qualifying age for children’s allowance was raised to 18 years for children in full-time education, in apprenticeships, or disabled. The total number of families in receipt of children’s allowances has risen from 132,000 in 1944 to about 500,000 at present [2001].

When first introduced, children’s allowance cost the State £2¼ million. This was the equivalent of 1¼ percent of national income or a quarter of the amount spent on all the other welfare payments put together: old age pensions, widows’ and orphans’ pensions, unemployment insurance and assistance, workmen’s compensation, national health insurance and public assistance.

It is generally accepted that the decline in numbers in the Schools from the mid 1940s was partly due to children’s allowances and it is noteworthy that the numbers being committed to the Industrial Schools peaked in 1943, the year before they were introduced.

Children from the following socio-economic groups were more likely to end up in a certified school: 1)Low-income and large families 2)Single-parent families 3)Orphans 4)Mentally-ill children. 1) Low-income and large families

Children from the lower socio-economic groups were represented in disproportionately high numbers in the Schools. The reason for poverty or deprivation might be badly-paid, insecure employment, unemployment or the loss of a parent. The Kennedy Report, Appendix E, Table 31 (Committee’s survey) gives the following figures (as of 1968) for the occupations of residents’ fathers. The penultimate column gives the percentage for each occupation as their children were represented in the Schools. For comparison, the final column shows the percentage of each occupation in the general national population.

Father’s occupation	Industrial Schools	Reformatories
Boys’ Schools	Girls’ and junior boys’ Schools	Totals	Boys’ Schools	Girls’ Schools	Totals	Totals for Industrial Schools and Reformatories %	National %
Farmer	4	42	46				46	1.9%	28%
Higher professional		7	7				7	0.3%	2.5%
Lower professional		9	9				9	0.4%	3%
Employer/ manager		4	4				4	0.2%	1.5%
Commercial worker (eg agent)		12	12				12	0.5%	12%
Clerical worker	10	29	39	3			42	1.7%
Intermediate non manual worker	27	85	112	4	1	5	117	4.7%	9.5%
Skilled tradesman	44	118	162	6	1	7	169	6.8%	7%
Semi-skilled worker	34	122	156	12	5	17	173	7%	7%
Agricultural labourer	22	76	98	1	1	2	100	4%	9%
Non-skilled worker	43	268	311	27	3	30	341	13.8%	5.5%
Unemployed	39	169	208	16	-	16	224	9%	7.3
Disabled	6	67	73	5	1	6	79	3.2%
Itinerant	11	51	62	4	1	5	67	2.7%
‘In England’	10	71	81	4	-	4	85	3.4%
Occupation unknown	95	349	444	3	1	4	448	18.1%
No reply	306	203	509	20	24	44	553	22.3%
Totals	651	1,682	2,333	105	38		2476

The McQuaid Artane survey found that a disproportionate number of School residents came from large families. 2) One-parent families

A great proportion of children in the schools came from families that were non-marital or one or both parents had died. Where it was the mother who died, then the conventional view might be taken that the father, especially if a full-time breadwinner, was not equipped to bring up the family (and even, because of an unspoken fear of incest, where there were daughters in the family should not do so). If it was the father who died then, while the homemaker remained, there was no breadwinner so that the family was likely to be impoverished.

If the child was born out of wedlock, the mother was likely to find herself in either a mother and baby home or a county home. The child might then be adopted formally or informally, boarded out or sent to an Industrial School.

The Kennedy Committee ascertained that only about 18 percent of children were known to the School to have parents who were married, alive and living together. Some 30 per cent of the children had one parent who was dead and it was not known in 35 percent of cases whether the father was alive, although the mother was.