Science and Administration 



of the facts impossible. Their existence in the 

 ordinary life of the community is an unmixed 

 calamity to themselves and to all their neigh- 

 bours. 



Yet it is not the duty of any one to know 

 about this. The Local Government Board super- 

 vises the administration of the Poor Law. The 

 Guardians or the Parish Councils carry it out. 

 The police act when the circumstances call for 

 them. Every one takes his part in the solemn 

 farce, with a more or less complete sense of the 

 inefficiency of what is being done. 



A crisis and a Parliamentary difficulty bring 

 about the appointment of a Royal Commission, 

 and possibly some step forward may result. But 

 what is required is not a Royal Commission to 

 deal with this or that phase of the problem of 

 poor relief or its substitutes. There cannot be 

 really efficient administration to deal with the 

 waste, if perhaps reclaimable, elements in the 

 population, unless it be permanently the duty of 

 some one to know the facts that need to be 

 provided for, and to advise the means best fitted 

 to deal with them ; and this is no departmental 

 task, because the wide scope of the problem really 

 obliterates the departmental landmarks. 



These are instances, which might easily be added 

 to, of the necessity of a larger outlook on problems 

 of domestic administration. It is only necessary 

 to refer in a word to the fact that our problem 

 is not merely national but Imperial also. If our 



national problems require constant consideration 



219 



