TRANSACTIONS OP SECTION P. 465 



increase. That is also the experience of other Governments. No economies but 

 the reverse are likely in connection with Old Age Pensions, Irish Development 

 Grant, Post Office, Revenue Collection, Local Government, Land Commission, 

 Department of Agriculture, and Education. The expenditure of county councils 

 and municipalities in Ireland has steadily increased since their start. 



(3) The British taxpayer should continue to give money for Irish purposes. 

 Ireland's average contribution to the Imperial Exchequer for the past two years 

 was 10,032,000Z. each year. 



But the total Irish expenditure last year was 11,344,5002. 



Add to this deficit the interest on Ireland's share of the National Debt and 

 a small contribution to Imperial expenses, and a new Parliament must start by 

 providing for a deficit of at least 4,000,0002. its fiist year. This deficit, with 

 growing expenditure in Ireland on Education, Public Works, and General De- 

 velopment, is certain to increase substantially each year. Ireland cannot pay it. 

 Great Britain must pay it, together with much of Ireland's share of Imperial 

 expenses, and also find the money (probably a total of over 200,000,0002.) for 

 Land Purchase. At the same time Great Britain would have no control over 

 this deficit. ' A plan so profligate, and so unjust, would not last more than 

 three or four years.' — Spectator. Ireland's credit under Home Rule must be 

 small. Her rateable valuation last year was 15,698,5302., that of Lancashire 

 being nearly 12,000,0002. 



The due balance between local and Imperial taxation is important in con- 

 sidering the financial relations between the two countries and Ireland's capacity 

 to bear increased taxation. The net expenditure of Irish local bodies from 

 revenue during last year was 6,844,6132., and the local indebtedness was 

 22,066,8342. 



The financial provisions of the forthcoming Bill will be viewed with dis- 

 trust, as no one will know how far the Government's Advisory Committee in 

 their investigations regarded Ireland as a unit for the purposes of taxation, 

 and equally a unit for the purposes of expenditure; nor will it be known what 

 figures were placed before the Committee. 



The following Papers were then read : — 



1. How Germany tries to Abolish Poverty and Crime (Extracts from the Official 

 Reports of the Armenpflcge of Berlin-Munich-Nuremburg, 190&-09). 

 By Miss Charlotte Smith-Eossie. 



This paper consisted principally of official extracts, but some idea of the 

 German Armenpflege is essential to understand it. This is a voluntary and unpaid 

 body armed with extraordinary power and having at its command the services of 

 the police and the Minister of the Interior. Its work is partly to relieve poverty, 

 but mostly to prevent it. Its regulations are therefore sometimes startling to us 

 whose Poor Law system is charitable almost entirely. Thus the German Armen- 

 pflege does not hesitate to demand repayment of its disbursements, and in the 

 Rhine Provinces even to make this repayment an essential before any marriage 

 can be performed with full civil rights. The marriage is valid in itself, but 

 the ' heimat ' or parish rights follow as if it was not valid. It regards the preser- 

 vation of the home as the chief hope of the reformation of the criminal. It will 

 store furniture of poor people temporarily forced to leave their homes rather than 

 see the home broken up. This is done for persons forced to go into hospitals, and 

 even for criminals of short sentence. Sometimes the rent is paid for similar 

 reasons. The desire to keep up the home is at the root of the German law of 

 Aussteuer or dowry— it is to prevent young married couples getting into the 

 trouble caused by furnishing ' on the hire system.' It is declared in the statutes 

 to be ' zur einrichtung des Haushalt ' or for the household. This watchfulness 

 over the causes of poverty and crime is at the root of the law which enables the 

 Armenpflege to bring a man before the law courts if he has wasted his substance 

 in a manner likely to impoverish his household. France and Switzerland have 

 also this law, but Britain has not. 



The peculiar institutions called variously ' Natural Verpflegungstationen ' and 

 1911. H H 



