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103
The name " Pensions for Mothers " which h?s been applied to
the Neil system, and the immediate idea under consideration in
Great Britain, is that all mothers who are widowed and have several
children dependent upon them should be granted as pension by the
Government a sum which will be sufficient to enable them to bring
up a family without the mothers having to go out to work.
For mothers who, either through absence of wages or through
the husband's incapacity for work, are unable to support their
children it is considered necessary that a system of mothers' pensions
should be established instead of their being allowed to become
inmates of the Workhouse, for the Poor Law Regulations do not
give the Guardians power to afford them out-door relief.
The matter came before Parliament on 8th April, 1919, for the
firsl time. The Government then accepted Mothers' Pensions in
principle, and agreed that, at as early a date as possible, it would
bring forward a Bill to put this system into operation here.
The proposals are as follow :—
1. That these pensions be limited to necessitous mothers
with more than one child, and that only where the father is dead or
incapacitated from work.
2. That the same amounts be given to the war widows
and their children, and that they be administered in the same way by
the same Department, the Ministry of Pensions.
3. That the same supervision be given as is given in the
case of war widows and their children.
4. That 75 per cent. of the money be provided by the
National Exchequer and 25 per cent. by the local rates.
The mothers being paid by the State are able to look after
their children at home instead of sending them to an institution,
thus preventing the separation of mothers and their children.