Other Reforms
What is also needed is a reform which will give the Parish Council itself more direct powers. The common cry of villagers, " What is the Parish Council doing?—nothing! " has, unhappily, a sound basis in fact. It can do very little. Many of its powers are delegated, most of them are not powers at all. Its members are often ignorant of the little they can do, with the result that the minutes of the last meeting become thinner and thinner, the meetings themselves often meaning- less. The crabbed, shaky signatures of aged parsons adorn too many inept pages in the records of English Parish Councils. As I look back over the minutes of my own parish as far back as the eighteen-nineties I have difficulty in finding a meeting whose minutes take up more than half a page and any item much more exciting than " To Widow X, the sum of thirteen shillings." Yet, in fact, the Parish Council can be the means of propagating a vigorous rural life. Its powers are delegated, but it can consistently harass the authorities which delegate those powers, and by a system of throwing itself at bureau- cratic brick walls can do something towards seeing that its parishioners are decently housed, its rights protected from injury by private persons, and its amenities properly preserved.
* * *
Previous page
