One of the major causes that was pursued throughout the 1880s was the problem of unemployment in the East End of London.
Pauperism was certainly rife in the district, and philanthropists were wrestling with the problem of how to improve the everyday lives, not to mention the educational prospects in childhood, of those who resided in the Victorian East End.
The Congleton And Macclesfield Mercury, took a look at the problems in its edition of Saturday the 29th of January, 1887:-
EAST END UNEMPLOYMENT
The unemployed question is not understood by the public.
There has not yet been in England a lack of work for strong men able to do a good day’s work at employment of a kind which exists in many trades.
It has happened through changes in certain industries and through over-production in others, that men who could work well, but only work at a particular class of job, have been thrown out of work without any fault of their own.
But there has never ceased to be for labourers of good character and of powerful arm more work than such labourers could be found to do.
NO REAL INCREASE IN PAUPERISM
On the other hand, there are always swarms of unemployed, but these unemployed are generally men who are not fit to compete with others in the contest for work of a severely fatiguing kind.
Taking the country through, there cannot be said to be an increase in pauperism.
EAST END DISTRESS
Taking London through, there is no increase in pauperism, and there are certain other tests which seem to shew that the East End distress is not exceptional.
The East End unions are those of Whitechapel, St. George’s-in-the-East, Stepney, Mile End Old Town, Poplar, Shoreditch, and Bethnal Green, the East End parts of which are stationary or decreasing in population.
Whitechapel, St. George’s-in-the-East and Shoreditch, are decreasing steadily, and the large increase in Poplar is an increase in its suburban districts.
SOME STATISTICS
Now within the circumscribed district known as the East End, if we take the death-rate, duration of life, deposits in banks, statistics of crime, or statistics of pauperism, we shall find that the death-rate has diminished, the duration of life has increased, the deposits in savings-banks has greatly risen, crime has decreased, and pauperism has decreased.
It is very difficult indeed, in face of these facts, which certainly cannot he upset, to believe that they are right who say that there has been a great increase of distress.
Outdoor relief has virtually been put down in the East End of London, and pauperism through the East End is only a little over two per cent, and far under the average of the whole country.
PAUPERISM CAN BE KEPT LOW
The reports from Mr. Valiance, of Shoreditch, and from the excellent workhouse officials of Mile End Old Town, go to show that not only can pauperism be kept very low in the East End, but that the pauper children can be got out into the world without fail in cases where proper steps are taken to train them in almost any class of simple work.
Mile End Old Town get out their boys as bootmakers, and even contrive to get out without fail the untrained boys as hairdressers.
Some of the unions send their boys to sea, but there is practically no difficulty found in placing them out in the world.
WORTH MUCH MORE THAN THEORY
A few facts like these are worth tons of theory, and we greatly fear that the philanthropists of whom we spoke the other day are in too many cases only playing into the hands of agitators by their exaggerated statements of evils which have always existed, but of which they have themselves only recently become aware.