Science in Public Affairs 



the parents from making necessary provision for 

 the child, and these are the cases for which chari- 

 table provision should perhaps be made. Clearly, 

 if help is given at all it should be adequate. The 

 Committee complain that most of the present 

 London schemes only provide one or two break- 

 fasts or dinners a week. This, they say, is of no 

 use at all. Money so spent is wasted, and the chil- 

 dren are probably injured rather than benefited 

 by their home arrangements being upset. The 

 meal, whether breakfast or dinner, (and there is 

 difference of opinion as to which it should be), 

 must be given every day the school meets. It will 

 cost probably from one penny to twopence, and 

 if some of the meals are given free, it has been 

 found generally impossible to induce any of the 

 parents to pay. The giving of meals to children 

 must be regarded as a serious inroad on parental 

 responsibility, and as such only to be undertaken 

 from sheer necessity. For obvious reasons the 

 selection of the children should not be left to the 

 teachers, though it is not unreasonable to ask them 

 for a preliminary list of children apparently need- 

 ing food. On no account should the selection 

 depend on questions asked directly from the chil- 

 dren. In one school the children who had had 

 no breakfast were asked to stand up. Two only 

 did so. Of these one had just eaten four slices of 

 bread and jam, and the other had had breakfast, 

 but had previously obtained twopence from a soft- 

 hearted Sunday School teacher by telling a similar 

 lie. Inquiries should therefore always be made 



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