THE CHARITABLE AID BOARD AND THE MAINTENANCE OF PAUPER CHILDREN.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXX, Issue 9308, 18 September 1893, Page 3

THE CHARITABLE AID BOARD AND THE MAINTENANCE OF PAUPER CHILDREN.

TO THE EDITOR. Sir,— am pleased to find that the Charitable Aid Board are about to look into the above question, and hope when doing so they will endeavour to stop the attempt that is being made to provide for the children of parents who are well able to support them, and should be made to do so, instead of drawing their support either from the taxation imposed by the local bodies or that of the General Government. An inspector of police not so long ago, if I am correctly informed, urged a magistrate to commit certain children to a sectarian home upon the plea that the local body would not have to provide for them. They would be a charge upon the consolidated revenue. Could any argument be more immoral?

It would be well to look for a moment at the cost of these children to the toiling masses, who, by the tax upon the necessaries of life, have to provide for these children. From the reports recently laid before the House of Assembly we find that the cost per child f6r the year ending December, 1892, was as follows :—Kohimarama, Auckland, £65 lis lid ; Government Home, Parnell. £59 16s 5d ; Burnham, Canterbury, £32 5s 7d ; Caversham, Otago, £30 Os 7d. Are not such sums as these monstrous, and yet the members of our Legislature raise no objection to them. A labouring man can and does maintain himself and children at an average cost of less than £10 per head ; a Methodist minister is allowed from £10 to £13 per annum to maintain and educate each child. Under the provincial system of government in New Zealand the cost per child was under £10 per annum. In the more extravagant days of Victorian administration the Government allowed £13 per annum for each child placed with a foster-parent, and had upon their books the names" of several hundreds of people ready and willing to take them at that rate as soon as committed. And yet in New Zealand they are allowed by a supposed economical Government to cost the enormous sums previously stated. I know that the figures I have given will be questioned, because in the reports on the Industrial Schools furnished by the Auckland Press it was made to appear that the cost per child on the average was only some £13 13s, and yet from the very paragraph from which those figures were taken there is a computation which shows that if you deduct the salaries, rent, and insurance from the sum paid to maintain the children in these schools and charge those items in the expenditure against the children not in the schools, but who are boarded out, the cost of those in residence would be reduced to £19155. Of course such a proposal is an absurdity upon the face of it, and shows the straits they are in to make things look better than they really t are.

in Auckland, if I mistake not, the cost of looking after the people with whom the children are located that are outside the institutions is very small, and might be less, for this is a duty that might fairly be undertaken by honorary visitors, as in other places, under the guidance of an experienced superintendent, who might be paid a small salary. If you put on one side all the comical culculations indulged in by the compilers of the report, which is simply so much dust thrown into the eyes of the people to hide up the reckless extravagance of the Department under whose supervision or non-supervision these Homes are conducted, you will find that the maintenance of the children cost the sum previously stated. The calculation is extremely'si tuple, if yon take the number of children in residence as shown in the report referred to, and divide them by the annual cost of the school, you get the figures I have previously given, viz., Kohimarama, per child. £65 lis lid; Parnell Government Home, £59 16s sd; Burnham, £32 5s 7d ; and Caversham, £30 0s 7d. For the proof of this let us. take the figures given as at December, 1892. Kohimarama: The number of children in residence was 18, the cost of school for the year, exclusive of those boarded out was £1180 14s lOd; Parnell Government Home, 7 children, cost, £418 15s stl; Burnham. 101 children, cost, £3260 3s lid; and Caversham, 92 children, cost £2913 2s 7d. With such results as these, which I think cannot be gainsaid, it is quite time we moved themselves to endeavour to alter such a state of things. Now let me, in conclusion, just suggest two other points for their consideration:—lst. The need of watching the legislation submitted upon these matters, or else some morning they will find themselves forced to main-" tain the children committed under the remaining two sections of the Industrial .Schools Act. More than one Government has tried to do this, and will no doubt try again, and so relieve the consolidated revenue at the cost of the local taxpayer ; and secoudly, see that the authorities of sectarian Homes do not use their influence upon certain Government officials to fill their Homes with children at the cost of the general taxpayer. The sum paid to maintain these children by the Government leaves a large margin of profit to the religious organisation which runs them. Already in St. Mary's, Auckland; St. Joseph's, Wellington, and St. Mary's, kelson, there are 502 children, a number out of all proportion to their numerical strength in the community.—l am, etc., Pro Bono Publico.

P.S. — is only fair to say that the calculation submitted is made upon the number of children in the Homes at the end of the year, but as a decrease in some of the Homes took place some time during the year, this would cause some difference in the average cost, but the exact sum cannot be stated, as the time when the decrease took place is not given.