PAUPERS AND PENSIONS.

Marlborough Express, Volume XLV, Issue 62, 14 March 1911, Page 6

PAUPERS AND PENSIONS.

Interesting figures showing the incorrectness of the prophecy that the removal of the pauper disqualification for old age pensions would bring about the doom of the Poor Law have been collected by the "Local Government Chronicle. Inquiries were sent to every workhouse in" England and Wales asking for the number of persons over 70 years of age in the institution, the number who had claimed pensions, and the number who had been granted pensions. Replies were received from nearly threefourths of the total number, and these show that while the number of inmates over 70 years of age was 27,000, only 4465 have put in claims for pensions, and of the 2664 cases in which pensions wers granted many afterwards withdrew their claims, while nearly 200, after trying the experiment, gave it up in despair, and returned to the workhouse.