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often very irregular, and their boundaries never intersected those 

 of the poor hiw parish, but they were laid down without reference 

 to any other area of local government. Our present poor law 

 system dated from 1601, but our present mode of administering 

 it dated from the creation of the Poor Law Amendment Act 1834. 

 In the country generally, apart from the metropolis, the Guardi- 

 ans consisted of two classes, elective and e.v-ojjicio, the Justices of 

 the Peace resident within the area of the Union being the ex-offido 

 Guardians. The number of elective Guardians was determined 

 by the Local Government Board. In the election of Guardians 

 the system of plural voting prevailed, and a person might have 

 from one to six votes according to his property qualification. A 

 resident owner might vote both as owner and ratepayer, the effect 

 of wliich was that with sufficient property qualification he might 

 have twelve votes. In the Burnley Union many of the Guardians 

 devoted one day a week and even more to the faithful discharge 

 of their duties. 



Having described the system of voting for Guardians he said 

 that in some respects it was more convenient than the ballot, 

 and cheaper. The objection against the system, however, was 

 the ease with which the voting papers could be tampered with. 

 A Select Committee of 1878 had reported that it was shown that 

 the abuse and inconvenience of the voting paper system as at 

 present carried on were very grave. The primary function of 

 Guardians was the administration of poor relief. Every poor 

 person who was unable to support himself had a right to relief. 

 On two questions the Guardians had to exercise an important 

 discretion. They had to decide whether out-door relief should 

 be given or the workhouse test applied. As regarded this question 

 the poor-law was very unequally administered in different Unions. 

 In the Preston Union with a population of 129,155 persons, £62 

 was disbursed in out-relief during last week ; whilst in the Burnley 

 Union with a population of 118,391, £184 was disbursed during 

 the same week. The other question was when out-door relief was 

 granted whether it should be given in money or in kind. The 

 latter mode had many advantages. The value of rehef might be 

 recovered from persons liable to maintain the persons relieved. 

 About £1,100 a year was recovered in this Union. Speaking of 

 the Casual Act of 1882 he said since its being put into force iu 

 Burnley the number of vagrants relieved had been reduced from 

 about 450 to about 30 per week. An important function lately 

 thrown upon the Guardians through the senseless repeal of the 

 25th clause of the Education Act was that of paying the school fees 

 for children whose parents were strangely termed non-paupers. 

 Last year the Guardians of the Burnley Union expended £360 

 in that manner. The cost of the poor-relief was now chargeable 

 on the common fund of the Union. This fund was formed by 



