BEVERIDGE AFTERTHOUGHTS
yr is rather more than a fortnight since the Beveridge Report was published. In that interval the report has almost eclipsed the war itself as a subject of discussion in this country ; it has been keenly debated by British troops overseas, and in the Dominions and the United States it has markedly increased the prestige of Britain as indicating an imaginative and courageous attempt to grapple, even in the midst of such a conflict as this, with those problems of social security which, so formidable before the war, may be even more formidable after it. Meanwhile the Government has the scheme under consideration, and it will be debated in the House of Commons after Christmas. That is, of course, most necessary and desirable. But it is no less necessary and no less desirable that everywhere where concern for the better- ment of social conditions in Great Britain prevails discussion among the ordinary citizens whom it affects should be initiated. A letter printed in another column purports to give news of the first local group formed to study the Beveridge Report systemati- cally. That is an example that should be widely followed. The report costs no more than two shillings, and there could be no better school of citizenship than its three hundred pages provide. Time devoted to study and discussion of the problems it raises would not be wasted even if no single one of the solutions Sir William Beveridge proposes ever materialised. For, if these solu- tions are not adopted, some others must be. Criticism of the scheme should be welcomed undisguisedly, provided always that it is constructive, and directed towards demonstrating not only where the Beveridge proposals are wrong, but how they can be improved on.
The discussions so far engaged in have brought various mis- apprehensions to light. One Labour M.P. has complained with some bitterness that this is not the pure gospel of Socialism. It is not. It would commend itself much less to many people if it were. But it resembles so closely what the Labour Party has con- stantly demanded in the past that expression:: of dissatisfaction with the scheme come a" little oddly from that quarter. Elsewhere Sir William is criticised for basing his proposals on the assump- tion that unemployment will somehow be kept in hand (not abolished) and making no attempt to show how that can be done. On that it may be observed that if any man in the country is capable of indicating methods of coping with the unemployment problem it is the author of what is still the standard work on the subject. But to complain that Sir William Beveridge, given a specific, searching and comprehensive task by the Government, did not on his own account shoulder another not less compre- hensive that lay completely outside his terms of reference is less than reasonable. There is nothing in those terms about schemes to avert unemployment, and the comment that the Beveridge scheme will only work if unemployment is abolished, and in that case will not be needed, is simply a facile and completely unsub- stantial attempt at epigram. The degree of unemployment will, of course, affect the finance of the scheme, as it has always affected the finance of the existing Assistance Board. The actual figures suggested by Sir William are based on the assumption of an average total of 1,5oo,000 unemployed. That may argue optimism or pessimism. It certainly does not argue blindness to the problem.
All the Beveridge figures, of course, are tentative, and it is nowhere suggested that the scheme must be either taken as it stands or sidetracked altogether. What Sir William has done is to produce a plan for putting the population out of the reach of want. If there is no sufficient desire to achieve that elementary reform or if it is found that to achieve' it would involve expendi- ture which, by reacting on our internal and external trade, would actually create more evils than it cured, then we shall have to be content with a more modest advance than Sir William has inspired us to attempt. Parts of his scheme could be postponed for the present, or indefinitely—such, for example, as the proposals for a comprehensive national health service. Here, as elsewhere, strange misunderstandings seem to exist. Sir William Beveridge, someone has written, has promised free and equal treatment for all without consulting the doctors. On that it may be observed first, that the doctors through the Planning Committee of the British Medical Association, have proposed some- thing very like this themselves, and secondly that Sir William, of course, has in fact promised nothing to anybody. It was no part of his business to promise anything. All he was asked to do was to consider how certain schemes of social insurance are at present working, and suggest any possible improvements. That he has done, in a document that can already be termed historic. With regard to the details of any plan for a national health service, he specifically expresses the view that they should be worked out by the Department, presumably the Ministry of Health, con- cerned with the health of the people. The importance of such a scheme, if only on hard financial grounds, is sufficiently demon- strated by the statement made by Sir Farquhar Buzzard in last week's Spectator that sickness and disability is at present costing the country some L3,000,000 a year.
But to recognise that everything in the Beveridge plan is open to discussion and revision does not mean that the plan can be simply shelved. Certain features of it could, no doubt, be dropped, but certain others must by general consent be adopted. Families are going hungry today because there are more children than the wage-earner can support adequately. No part of the new plan has been hailed with more enthusiasm than the proposed provision of family allowances. That part of the Beveridge scheme will inevitably materialise, though not necessarily in the precise form, or on the basis of the precise figures, recommended there. Old age pensions, again, will unquestionably have to be increased. There is no more pathetic figure in the community today than the man or woman of over 70 struggling to maintain life some- how on a maximum figure of 19s. 6d. a week, subject to a means test, against the 24s. to 25s. which the most experienced authori- ties regard as the minimum necessary for subsistence. Our responsibilities to that section of the community are not to be ignored. As regards medical treatment, again, steps will indisput- ably have to be taken in the direction of the goal which the Beveridge plan contemplates. In the article already quoted Sir Farquhar Buzzard recalled the promises made by the Minister of Health regarding co-ordination of the hospital system of the country, and added that under the Regional Hospital Scheme which the Nuffield Trust has been working out it was found essential to include private practitioners. It is only necessary to add that an immense load would be lifted not only from workers' but from middle-class families if the immensely expensive surgical or institutional treatment to which they may have to have recourse at any moment were made available under such a comprehensive insurance scheme as the Beveridge Report has proposed.
It may well be that here, as so often in life, what we want we cannot have. It would be absurd to disregard the financial aspect of the question or treat it as subordinate. But to assume forthwith that the financial obstacles are insuperable is as gratui- tous as to assume them non-existent. It is impossible to foresee what economic conditions after the war will be, and impossible in particular to know how far standards of life everywhere can be raised by international action—a most material consideration when there is danger that an increase in labour costs here, as the result of expensive social reform schemes, may put us at a disadvantage in competitive export-markets. All that may be conceded. In resolving to go to the utmost limits of the possible, we must recognise that beyond them an impossible may lie. But at least we can determine not to stop short of that limit, wherever it may be. Even if we would we dare not, for demands will be made when this war is over that cannot be ignored. Men and women in the Services and munition-factories today will not tolerate the social conditions that prevailed before the war, with the hazards of old age and ill-health and unemployment overhanging them still ; a question of social security in two senses will arise. For better or worse the Beveridge scheme has already aroused great expectations. The only practical, as well as the only humane, policy is to go to the utmost length to satisfy them, and, so far as that is not possible, to be able to show convincing reason why. The first step is to create a Ministry of Social Security to con- centrate on the whole problem.
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