Reinventing the dole: Chapter 10

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CHAPTER 10: THE HOUSEHOLD MEANS TEST: (2) OTHERRESOURCES

The main policy decisions on the treatment of household resources

other than earnings were made in 1934, subsequent changes being ofrelatively minor importance. This chapter, therefore, covers the wholeperiod up to 1940. The policies adopted by the board on many of thesequestions were of limited importance at the time, in view of the smallnumber of cases affected, but, like many other detailed policy questionsdecided by the board in its early days, they were to affect much largernumbers in later years.

Statutory disregards: the war pensioners lobby

The provisions of the Unemployment Assistance Act regardingresources other than earnings were mainly carried over from theTransitional Payments (Determination of Need) Act 1932 and earlierpoor law legislation, the origins of which are described in chapter 1.Thus, the first 5s. per week of sick pay from a friendly society, the first7s.6d. of national health insurance benefit and at least part of any warwounds or disability pension or workmens compensation payment wereto be disregarded, whether received by the applicant or by anothermember of the household. The treatment of capital resources was alsotaken over from the 1932 Act. The one change made during thepassage of the 1934 Act concerned the treatment of war pensions:

instead of only half, the whole of the pension was to be disregarded upto a maximum of 1 per week. Since the highest pension payable to aprivate, for 100 per cent disability, was 2 a week, and most disabilitieswere assessed at 35 per cent or less, the 1 disregard was markedlymore generous. It resulted from persistent pressure by the BritishLegion for an extension of the concession granted in 1932.

The Ministry of Labour was at first reluctant to yield to such pressure.The 1932 Act, Reid complained, had struck at the root principle of allpublic relief, namely, that the community helps only those who cannothelp themselves. If a further concession was needed, he suggested, it

might take the form of a disregard of 8s. per week (the rate of pensionfor 20 per cent disablement) or half the pension, whichever was greater,on the grounds that pensions for minor disabilities could be regarded ascompensation rather than maintenance payments.1 Eady believed thiswould satisfy the pensioners parliamentary champion, Captain IanFraser, but the Ministry of Pensions, directly responsible for warpensions, regarded it as a dangerous precedent which could lead todemands for the whole pension to be disregarded, and warned againstover-estimating the importance of the British Legion, whose 300,000membership, out of a total of 4.5 million ex-service men, was verylargely made up of small local clubs which have secured a licence to sell

liquor.2 Fraser, under pressure to raise the stakes, tabled amendmentsto the Unemployment Bill, first for a minimum disregard of 12s., thenraising the figure to 1 in line with the British Legions demand (its

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Scottish branch wanted the whole disability pension disregarded). OnEadys advice, the 1 disregard was conceded to dispose of the matteronce and for all.

The case for disregarding payments made as compensation for

disability applied equally to workmens compensation payments, whichhad been treated in the same way as war pensions by the 1932 Act, butEady now argued that there was no true analogy3 and the 1 disregardwas not extended to workmens compensation, the existing disregard ofone-half being retained. The policy of equal treatment of war andindustrial disablement pensions was later to be restored by the NationalAssistance Act 1948.

Non-statutory disregards: the one-third rule

The treatment of a wide range of other types of income was discussed

by the board in September 1934. Some preliminary conclusions werereached, but the following week the officials reported that thedifficulties had proved greater than expected. They proposed, therefore,that the amounts to be allowed for personal requirements should not bestated in the regulations but should be such amounts as seemedreasonable in the circumstances.4 When a draft of the regulations wassubmitted to Stanley, he complained that this was too vague and aminimum allowance of a third of the amount by which the incomeexceeded the needs of the recipient and his or her dependants wasinserted.5 Thus, if members of the household had income, other than

earnings, not covered by the statutory disregards, they would beallowed to retain an amount to meet their own needs, assessedaccording to the boards scale, plus one-third of any excess.

The one-third rule did not apply to income received by the applicant;indeed, the 1934 regulations did not provide for any part of theapplicants own income, other than earnings and the statutorydisregards, to be ignored. The omission was remedied in the 1936regulations, under which a reasonable amount of the applicants ownincome could be allowed for personal requirements, but without anyminimum.

Apart from earnings and the statutory disregards, therefore, thetreatment of resources was to remain largely discretionary. Theremaining sections of this chapter are mainly concerned with the way inwhich discretion was exercised.

Unemployment insurance

Since the fundamental purpose of unemployment assistance allowanceswas to replace or supplement unemployment insurance benefit, it wouldhave been illogical for the board to disregard any part of the benefitpaid to the applicant or to the applicants wife or husband. If another

member of the household was receiving unemployment benefit,however, the case for a partial disregard was stronger. At a boardmeeting in October 1934, Betterton advanced three arguments in

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support of a disregard: that part of the benefit was needed to meet theexpense of seeking work, that it was important to avoid impairing theattractiveness of unemployment benefit, and that benefit wassomething for which the claimant has in part paid. The board wasimpressed mainly by the second of these arguments.6 The Treasuryfound the case for a disregard less convincing: Gilbert commented thatit rested entirely on sentiment, but nevertheless admitted that it wasperhaps in some ways strong.7 At the boards next meeting it wasagreed in principle that part of the benefit should be allowed forpersonal requirements.8 Shortly after, the one-third rule explainedabove was adopted. When the revised regulations came into force inNovember 1936, the board used its discretion to treat unemploymentbenefit more generously. If the recipient was the applicants parent,child, or brother or sister without dependants, the allowance forpersonal requirements was to be a half instead of a third of the excess

over his or her scale rate. If the relationship was less close, the whole ofthe excess was to be ignored.9

Trade union benefit

Different considerations applied to unemployment benefit paid by tradeunions out of their own funds. Such payments, particularly by the largerunions, were common. The rates laid down in union rule books weregenerally between 5s. and 20s. a week, but many unions had beenforced to cut their benefits. The duration of benefit varied between tenand twenty-six weeks, which meant that most of the boards applicants

would have exhausted their entitlement, but other members of theirhouseholds might still qualify.10 The situation was complicated by thearrangement under which unions with benefit schemes of their owncould take over responsibility for paying state unemployment benefit totheir members. The purpose of this arrangement, introduced under theNational Insurance Act 1911 at the start of the state scheme, was topreserve and encourage voluntary schemes. The unions concerned,therefore, strongly objected to their members having their unionbenefits effectively confiscated by the board.

Trade union benefit was covered by the one-third rule but in March

1935 the TUC asked for a total disregard of superannuation, accidentand unemployment benefits,11 and both the TUC and individual unionscontinued to demand at least a partial disregard of benefits payable toapplicants as well as to members of their households. Towards the endof 1937, their persistence paid off when the board decided, first, thatthe whole of a non-dependants trade union benefit should be allowedfor his or her personal requirements12 and then, the day after Rushcliffehad received a TUC deputation on the subject, that the first 5s. perweek paid to the applicant or to the applicants spouse should bedisregarded. The numbers affected by the latter decision, Eady toldboard members, would be small and the cost negligible.13

Voluntary payments

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The board at first paid little attention to the question of voluntarypayments from friends, relatives or charitable bodies. A memorandumdiscussed by the board in September 1934 referred to other casualreceipts, noting that it was doubtful whether in many cases they wouldcome to the boards notice. If they did, it was suggested, sums of theorder of 5s. a month could be disregarded.14 The board agreed, but theinitial instructions made no explicit reference to such payments. Ifreceived by non-dependent members of the household, they werecovered by the one-third rule.

At the beginning of 1935 the question arose in a particularly sensitivecontext. The Gresford Colliery Relief Fund had been set up for victims ofthe recent Gresford disaster and their families. The Wrexham (NorthWales) district officer reported that men out of work as a result of theclosure of the mine were getting weekly payments of 6s. for a singleman, 8s. for a married man and 3s. per child from the fund, which the

local authorities had ignored in assessing transitional payments. Thepayments were expected to cease at the end of the month and it wasagreed that the boards officers should ignore them.15 The payments,however, turned out to be more numerous, of longer duration and, insome cases, considerably larger than expected. At the beginning ofMarch, it was reported that about 65 of the boards applicants werereceiving them and those aged 16-18 were getting 11s. per weekinstead of 6s. to compensate for the fact that they were too young toqualify for adult rates of unemployment benefit.16 As the Gresfordminers exhausted their unemployment benefit entitlement, the numberof cases dealt with by the board increased rapidly. By August 1935,about 550 applicants were receiving payments from the fund.17 At thatpoint the relief fund committee decided to discontinue payments tominers whose need was due solely to unemployment,18 but payments tomen injured in the disaster and to the relatives of those who had diedcontinued and there were complaints that in some cases the boardsofficers were taking these payments into account.19

Gresford was a special case but it illustrated the difficulties the boardfaced in dealing with voluntary payments. Charitable help to theunemployed might be discouraged if it resulted in the intendedbeneficiaries getting less help from the board. The issue was raised in

more general terms in January 1935, when the Society of Friends askedwhether they could make small allowances to their members to bringthem up to a standard which we think desirable without the boardsallowances being reduced.20 Eady replied:

The Board does not feel ... that it is required to follow a policywhich says that a man receiving an allowance from the Boardshall not receive anything from anyone else, or which would makeit impossible, for example, to improve the position of a personwho is in receipt of an allowance ...

If the Society made a small grant to meet additional requirements,

therefore, it would not lead to a reduction in the boards allowance.21

Eadys letter formed the basis of an instruction on the treatment of

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voluntary payments generally, whether from a charitable body or not.The first 5s. per week of payments to the applicant or his dependantswere to be treated as for special needs and disregarded. If thepayments exceeded 10s. per week, the case was to be referred toheadquarters. Voluntary payments to other members of the householdwere to be treated as for their personal requirements and thus whollydisregarded, no upper limit being suggested.22

These instructions were further modified in April 1937. Where anapplicants rent was too high to be met in full by the board, officerswere authorised to disregard voluntary payments to the extent of theunmet rent. In addition, the 5s. disregard was to be increased to halfthe amount of the voluntary payments if they exceeded 10s. per week,with discretion to disregard entirely payments of up to 10s. for specialneeds such as arise out of old age or reduced circumstances, or wherethe obligation to make the payment was extremely slight.23

The overall effect of the instructions was that most voluntary payments,whether to applicants themselves or to members of their households,were entirely disregarded. The cost to public funds was probably smallin comparison with the benefit both to the applicants concerned and tothe boards reputation.

Maintenance payments

In chapter 25 we show how the board used its discretionary powers toenable absent husbands and fathers to meet their obligations and the

problems that this involved. Here, we are concerned with the treatmentof maintenance payments in the hands of the recipients. Wherepayments were made to a member of the household, the one-third ruleapplied: the recipient was allowed to retain at leasta third of theamount by which they exceeded her own needs and those of herchildren. Under an instruction issued in February 1935, payments underan affiliation order were to be treated as solely for the benefit of thechild, even if they exceeded the childs scale rate.24

Maintenance payments received by the applicant or his or her spousewere at first taken into account in full, but under the 1936 regulations a

partial disregard was possible. The April 1937 circular on voluntarypayments drew a distinction between husbands or fathers who wereabsent for short periods (the intermittent class) and those whoseldom or never returned to the household (the permanent class). Apayment by a temporarily absent husband was to be taken into accountin full. If the absence was permanent, a discretionary disregard of up to5s. a week was authorised, giving separated husbands a modestincentive to make such payments. The same rule was to apply tovoluntary payments by absent sons and daughters.25

PensionsPensions of all kinds, other than war disability pensions, were coveredby the one-third rule if payable to non-dependent members of the

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household. They included both the state old age pension and pensionsfrom employers and trade union superannuation schemes, as well asservice dependants pensions which are discussed separately below.Special protection was given to the old age pension which, at 10s. perweek, could exceed the pensioners scale rate under the 1934regulations by up to 3s. If the pensioners income consisted solely of theold age pension, the whole of it was allocated to his or her own needs,in line with the practice of public assistance authorities.26

Under the 1936 regulations, a more generous rule was adopted forpensions other than the old age pension, one-third being allowed forpersonal requirements, in addition to the scale rate, provided this didnot result in the pension being treated more generously than earningsof the same amount. The instructions gave two examples. In the first,the pensioner was the applicants brother, with a pension of 20s. perweek of which 16s.8d. was allowed for personal requirements, leaving

3s.4d. to be set against the applicants needs. In the second example,the applicants father had a pension of 40s., of which 32s. was allowedfor personal requirements (the amount allowed under the earnings rule)and 8s. set against the applicants needs.27

In the less common situation where the applicant himself was in receiptof a pension, it was at first taken fully into account. This causedresentment, especially where the pension was financed, at least in part,by the pensioners past contributions. The Amalgamated EngineeringUnion was reported to be discouraging its members from claimingsuperannuation benefit while receiving an allowance from the board.28

The situation was eased by the 1936 instructions, under which 5s. perweek of an applicants pension was to be disregarded, in line with thetreatment of voluntary payments. A further relaxation was made in April1937: as with other voluntary payments, where a pension over 10s. aweek was paid by an employer on a voluntary basis, half of it was to bedisregarded.29

Service dependants pensions

The treatment of pensions paid to relatives of men killed in the 1914-18war was a particularly sensitive question, not only because of the

circumstances in which they were payable but also because of theirrelatively high value. When the question was discussed in September1934, Reynard strongly objected to any part of the pension beingregarded as available for the needs of other members of thehousehold.30 The boards initial instructions, however, did not provide forany specific disregard beyond the one-third rule.

At the beginning of May 1935, the Newport, Monmouthshire, districtoffice drew attention to two cases to be heard by the Ebbw Vale appealtribunal, one of which was described as particularly hard: an 80-year-old woman with a 10s. old age pension and an 18s. service dependants

pension, living with her unemployed son aged 47 and a daughter aged49 suffering from tuberculosis. As her needs were assessed at only 8s. aweek, she was assumed to be contributing two-thirds of the remainder

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of her income, or 13s.4d. a week, towards the needs of the household,leaving her son with an allowance from the board of only 12s. Theappeal tribunal reversed this decision, treating both pensions asavailable only for the mothers needs, thus more than doubling thesons allowance. The feeling among officials in the district was in favourof generosity31 and the headquarters official concerned agreed thatthere were grounds for paying the son more than 12s.,32 but no changewas made in the instructions at that stage.

The question was raised again in March 1936. The mother of a 29-year-old unemployed man had a service dependants pension of 26s.8d. outof which she was assumed to contribute 7s.8d. towards her sons needs,reducing his allowance from 10s. to 2s.6d. a week.33 Reid advised thatthe 10s. allowance should be paid in full and any similar cases shouldbe referred to the district officer to decide what would be reasonable.34

The instructions issued later that year reflected this view: the whole of

the pension was to be retained by the recipient unless it was over 30s. aweek, in which case the question would be referred to the district office.Where the applicant or a dependant was the pensioner, the normalpension disregard of 5s. was to apply.35

Forces reserve pay

Payments to members of the army, navy and air force reserves wereanother example of extraneous considerations overriding the principleof the means test. As the international situation worsened, the board

came under increasing pressure to refrain from any action which woulddiscourage recruitment. From the start reserve pay was given specialtreatment. Men recruited since January 1931 were paid 3 6s. perquarter for service in the reserves, and half this amount was allowed forpersonal requirements, whether it was received by the applicant or amember of the household. The other half was deducted from theboards allowance for one or more weeks.36 Under the 1936 regulations,the board offered a further concession: reserve pay received by amember of the household other than the applicant would be entirelydisregarded.37 But the service departments, short of recruits, nowdemanded similar treatment for reserve pay received by applicants

themselves. Eadys response was that this could not be done without apolitical decision by the cabinet. The most he could offer was a moregenerous approach in individual cases, for instance treating thepayments as weekly income spread over the following quarter andperhaps awarding discretionary additions to offset the weekly income insome cases; but it would have to be done without publicity. The offerdid not satisfy the War Office, since an unpublicised concession woulddo nothing to help recruitment.38

The boards officials privately conceded that reserve pay was notintended for maintenance and was often used for expenses such as the

replacement of clothing, and that it was difficult to justify treating it lessfavourably than servicemens pensions, which were intended formaintenance and of which the first 5s. per week (roughly what

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reservists recruited since 1931 were paid) was disregarded. The board,therefore, offered to disregard both the basic reserve pay of 9d. a dayand the extra 6d. a day paid to Class A reservists (a small minority,liable to be called up at any time)39 and this offer was accepted. Pre-1931 reservists, paid 1s. a day, would still have part of their pay takeninto account, but this did not affect new recruits.

Education maintenance allowances

Maintenance grants were awarded by most local education authorities,mainly to enable children over 14 to pursue courses of secondary andtechnical education. The board at first proposed to treat the grant ascovering both normal maintenance and extra educational expenses.40

Under pressure from the Board of Education, however, it was agreedthat if the grant did not exceed 15 a year (about 6s. a week), it would

be treated as being for education costs only and disregarded by theboard. If the grant was more than 15 or was for a young person atcollege or university, the case would be referred to the district officerwho might decide that part of it was intended for the childsmaintenance, resulting in a reduction of the parents allowance.41

In January 1939 the Rhondda education committee in South Walescomplained about the treatment of cases where scholarships of 40 perannum had been awarded to university students, which the board hadtaken to include an element for the students maintenance.42 Anestimate supplied by the principal of University College, Cardiff, put the

cost of books, clothes and pocket money for a student living at home at44 10s. a year,43 and the Board of Education confirmed that localauthority scholarships were not intended to cover full maintenancecosts.44 It was therefore decided that university scholarships, like schoolmaintenance grants, would be regarded as covering only the additionalexpenses connected with the course and that the student wouldcontinue to be treated as a dependant of his or her unemployedparent.45

School meals

Under the Education Act 1921, local education authorities could providefree school meals to elementary school children who were unablethrough lack of food to take advantage of the education provided forthem and whose parents could not afford to pay. The cost was dividedequally between central and local government. Scottish educationauthorities had similar powers and were obliged to use them. Inpractice, the basis on which children were selected for free meals variedfrom area to area. Some local authorities relied on medical evidencewhile others, including some of the largest authorities such as London,Birmingham, Manchester and Lancashire, awarded free meals wholly ormainly on the basis of low income.46

In November 1933 the Board of Education suggested that the UABought to bear the cost of school meals for its applicants children, as

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some public assistance authorities had done in the past. Thatsuggestion was eventually rejected, mainly on grounds of cost: far morefree meals would be provided if the whole cost, instead of only half,were to be borne by central government.47 It remained for the board todecide to what extent free school meals should be treated as part of thehousehold income. Since the allowances for children in the boardsscale were intended to cover the cost of food, it did not seemreasonable to ignore them entirely, especially where a local authorityprovided more than one meal a day (Sheffield and Abertillery providedthree meals a day and Jarrow, Ebbw Vale and West Ham provided two48).The policy adopted by the board, however, was generous enough toensure that in most cases the value of school meals was disregardedand that, where it was not, the effect on the boards allowances wassmall. No deduction was made if the family did not receive more thantwo meals a day - one meal for two children or two meals for one child.

For larger numbers of meals, a deduction was made of about 1d. permeal; but meals provided on the basis of a doctors certificate that thechild was suffering from a specific pathological condition and requiredextra nourishment were also ignored.49 The Board of Education acceptedthis policy as reasonable, though with some misgivings regarding thepractical difficulty of distinguishing between children suffering from aspecific pathological condition and those who were simplyundernourished.50 In April 1935, an additional instruction was issued tothe effect that meals provided in special schools for physically andmentally handicapped children were to be disregarded.51

Despite the relatively small number and size of the deductions made,there were allegations of children being withdrawn from school meals insome areas as a result of the boards policy. In Jarrow there was said tohave been a marked decline in the number of children receiving freemeals, which the school inspector ascribed to the boards deductions,52

and there were similar complaints from other areas. The boardsenquiries, however, revealed very few such cases.53 There was, on theother hand, some evidence of local authorities, including the LondonCounty Council, withholding free school meals from families receivingallowances from the board on the grounds that the board wasresponsible for meeting their needs.54 In a representative sample of

school children in applicants households, only 8 per cent were receivingfree milk and food and 5 per cent were receiving free food withoutmilk,55 but these figures do not necessarily indicate discriminationagainst the boards clients, many of whose children would not havequalified for free meals on grounds of educational need.

The real concern of officials at the Board of Education was that localauthorities should be encouraged to provide meals on medical ratherthan economic grounds: it was not the Authoritys business to relievepoverty as such but to feed children who are under-nourished andtherefore failing to profit fully by their education. In May 1935 they

suggested that the UAB should support this policy by disregarding allmeals provided on medical grounds, rather than only those where therewas a specific pathological condition.56 Hancock agreed on the boards

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behalf that it would consider doing so, despite the fact that it would givea financial advantage to feckless parents whose children wereunderfed;57 but the Board of Education then decided that theadministrative difficulties of distinguishing between children selected onmedical and financial grounds were too great and suggested insteadthat the UAB should ignore the value of school meals altogether.58 InNovember 1935 the board decided to do so on the introduction of thenew regulations the following year.59 From November 1936, therefore,free school meals were wholly disregarded.

The issue was raised again in 1939. In response to a demand by theChildrens Minimum Council that all children in families below a certainincome level should get free school meals, the parliamentary secretaryto the Board of Education, Kenneth Lindsay, pointed out that the UABwould be bound to take it into account and therefore the familieswould not be any better off.60 Reid, however, objected to the UAB

being held up as being the villains of the piece.61 The board hadalready conceded that meals given on specific medical grounds oughtto be ignored. They were unlikely to go back on this by taking all mealsinto account; and even if they decided to take them into account to alimited extent, it would arouse criticism of such a character that weshould find ourselves bound in the event to give way.62 The Board ofEducation conceded the point 63 and when, some years later, free schoolmeals were made available generally on grounds of low income, theycontinued to be wholly disregarded by the Assistance Board.

Capital

The rules regarding capital resources adopted in 1932 for transitionalpayments were re-enacted in the Unemployment Assistance Act: thevalue of the home and the first 25 of other capital were to bedisregarded, and every complete 25 between 25 and 300 was to betreated as producing an income of 1s. per week (an annual rate ofinterest of 10.4 per cent). The act did not say how capital in excess of300 was to be treated, but the guidance issued to public assistanceauthorities in 1932 was that the applicant would only in veryexceptional circumstances be able to prove that he was in need,64 and

the board adopted a similar policy.65 The regulations provided for moregenerous treatment of capital belonging to members of the householdother than the applicant or the applicants wife, husband or parent: the300 limit was raised to 400, and only the actual income derived fromthe capital was taken into account.

The number of applicants with capital resources was small. We do notknow how many were refused assistance on these grounds, but it wasestimated that at the end of 1937, of about 570,000 applicants actuallyreceiving allowances, only some 12,500 had capital resources of theirown or their wives or husbands, other than their homes, the average

amount being about 100. The number of other household memberspossessing capital was even smaller: about 1,280 parents and 1,780others.66

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Despite the small numbers, some types of capital were problematic; inparticular, there were complaints about the treatment of lump sumpayments of workmens compensation. While half of any weeklyworkmens compensation payments were to be disregarded, thestatutory disregard did not apply to lump sum payments. The boardslegal adviser, Stuart King, suggested a way around the difficulty. Therules on the treatment of capital applied only to money andinvestments treated as capital assets. If the board were to treat a lumpsum workmens compensation payment as income rather than capital,part of it could be allowed for personal requirements.67 This ratherstrange and artificial argument (as Reid put it)68 was used to justifydisregarding half the payment.69

A few cases arose where a member of the household owned houseproperty other than the home. Its value was generally ignored at leastfor a short time to enable the owner to dispose of it. In some cases it

was accepted that there were good reasons for retaining the propertyand only the income derived from it was taken into account.70

Another type of assets which did not fit comfortably into the normalrules were endowment assurance policies. If an income was assumedbased on the policys capital value, the policy holder might becompelled to surrender it. One of the boards regional officers, W LAddeyman, argued that, since the board did not make any allowance forinsurance premiums, they should disregard the capital value.71 Thissomewhat dubious argument (it could equally have been applied to anyother regular form of savings) was accepted as reasonable, provided

that the policy was not of very high value.72

But a different view wastaken of a 300 endowment policy purchased out of money won on afootball pool by an unemployed miner who, one of the boards officialswrote, does not appear very deserving.73

The possibility of distinguishing between savings resulting frompersonal thrift and money obtained in other ways was discussed in amemorandum by Stuart King in July 1934, but it was hard to see wherethe line could be drawn. Kings conclusion, which the board accepted,was that the question was best left to be decided in each case, subjectto general guidance.74 The boards initial instructions included a section

on the distinction between capital assets and income. Money savedover a period, received as a bequest or invested in stocks, shares orhouse property was to be treated as capital. Occasional charitable giftsand co-op dividends were also to be treated as capital, provided thatthe board was not exposed to criticism for paying public money to aman who at the same time is spending considerable sums on non-essentials. Lump sum payments representing arrears of income, on theother hand, were to be treated as income, spread over the number ofweeks in respect of which the arrears were payable.75

If an applicant who had received a lump sum proceeded to spend it, hisweekly allowance might be affected in two ways. The first, referred to at

a meeting of district officers in April 1936, was that the money could betreated as income available to meet current needs;76 the second, that he

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could be treated as being still in possession of at least part of themoney that had been spent. This was done in a number of casesreported in 1937 and 1938 where a lump sum compensation paymentwas considered to have been misspent. In most of these cases the merefact that the money had been spent seems to have been taken asevidence of misspending, but in one case reported by the Cardiff districtoffice where a 500 payment had been reduced to 72 in elevenmonths the applicant was said to have made a statement that hetravelled to Bath every week end to visit his young lady, and spent themoney on having a good time, drinking, etc.77

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Reinventing the dole: a history of the Unemployment Assistance Board 1934-1940byTony Lynesis licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported License. To view a copy of this license,

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Reinventing the dole: Chapter 10

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