TO LAY THE SPECTRE..

Evening Post, Volume LXXVI, Issue 144, 17 December 1908, Page 7

TO LAY THE SPECTRE..

DEPUTATION OF UNEMPLOYED. __ LEGISLATION PROMISED. By Telegraph.— Press Association.— Copyright (Received December 17, 8.5 a.m.) LONDON, 16th December. The Prime Minister (Eight Hon. H. Asquith) assured a deputation from the London Central Unemployed and other provincial distress committees that the Government hoped soon to submit proposals of a permanent definite busi-ness-like character, setting up machinery to prevent the re-appearance at intervals of the spectre of unemployment, thus going to the root of the problem. Unemployment has become a burning question in the Old Countiy during tho current winter. Mr. lieir iiardie, during a discussion in tho House of Commons on 26th October, appealed to the Government not to leave the distribution of the grant for the unemployed to th*e Local Government Board, but to appoint a special committee of the Cabinet to supervise its expenditure. Mr. John Burns, President of the Local Government Board, vigorously defended the Government. He said there was not a distress committee that was able to complain that the money demanded of the Local Government Board for relief work had been withheld. The present crisis was not as bad as the state of affairs that existed at the time of the passing of the Unemployed Workmen Act in 1905. The accelerating of various works as set out in Mr. Asquith's statement meant that the sum of rive millions would be expended before March next. The best agencies for work were also better acquainted with deserving *.ai,M> than the Central (Unemployed) Body could be. The Minister's reply did not satisfy Mr. Hardie, who last week introduced a Bill to amend the Unemployed Act. Under this measure it is proposed to authorise the local authorities to pay wages out of the halfpenny rate they are already empowered to collect, and the Local Government Board may appoint local distress committees in places where none exist but are found to be required. A conference, held last week at the Guildhall, under the auspices of the Right to Work National Council, recommended an increase in the unemployed grant to one million pounds, the money to be available for distribution through agencies besides the Distress Committees.