Mr. Geoffrey Drage, who has to his credit the fact
that he is the first person who has ever extracted from the Government a statement of the amounts spent on Public Assistance, sent another valuable letter to the Times on Wednesday. He pointed out that the total expenditure on direct public assist- ance rose from £25,000,000 in 1890 to £88,880,000 in 1911, and to £312,000,000 this year. The beneficiaries number about 28,000,000, out of a total population of not more than 48,000,000, including those benefiting under the various education Acts. Mr. Drage, writing for the Denison House Committee on Public Assistance, suggests that the figures of public assistance should be issued annually ; that the statement should contain not only the actual expenditure under each Act, but estimates of future expenditure from the rates as well as from taxes ; that administrative expenditure for smaller districts than England, Scotland, Wales, and Ireland should be given so that some standard of administrative cost might be obtained ; and that the statement should show to what extent there is overlapping in the receipt of benefits. The Denison House Committee expresses the opinion that when the facts are known the nation will compel a. remedy even though this should take the drastic form of handing over direct public assistance to a small executive commission or board formed on non-party lines, following the precedent set by Parliament a century ago.
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