COMMITTEES AS UNDERTAKERS
By GRAY TEMPLE
MR. ASQUITH—as. he- then was—drew the fingers of his right hand across his chin, and I knew that he was about to deliver himself of a bit of pawkish humour embodying a mighty truth. Members had been agitating for a certain reform, and the Government had announced the setting-up of a Departmental Com- mittee to investigate the "relevant facts." The ex- Premier and I were discussing the proposal, "Commit- tees," he said, "are both pathologists and undertakers ; they dissect the body—and then bury it." Which is precisely what happened in that particular instance. And it has happened in many others. As witness : Before the War, owing to an agitation by the public and declarations by His Majesty's judges, petitions to the Home Secretary and protests in the courts, there was set up a Departmental Committee to enquire into the grievances and complaints of jurors. A mass of evidence was taken, and an elaborate report and recom- mendations presented in due course. While there was some reservation about the payment of jurymen, there was unanimity (shared by the judges) that those who were summoned to sit on a jury should be paid their out-of-pocket expenses. The body was, indeed, • dis- sected—and buried. It still lies in its -grave. Mean- while thousands of jurors are called from their work, or business, to the courts, their time is often wasted—and they are always financially worse off :for their efforts. In the country small shopkeepers have to attend • at the assizes—in sonic eases 30 miles. away—and remain there, maybe, for a -week and often longer. Meanwli e, the shutters are up on their shops ; they lose . business, and, in addition, have to pay their own rail fares and sustenance away from home. All for the sum of one shilling ! The Committee's Report, if translated into legislation, would have changed all this, and removed the injustice. But the " undertaker " has done his work too well.
. In 1912, the.Royal Commission on Divorce issued their famous Report. Presided over by the late Lord Gorell, the commission sat for over two years, and examined no fewer than 246 witnesses. By a majority of nine to three, it made recommendations for reform which, . the report declared, was essential "in the interests of morality as well as in- the interests of justice, and in _the general interests of society and the State." But, to quote the words of the late Lord Buckmaster, " that report has been buried, and the dust that gathers over its grave prevents people from seeing and understanding the effect of what it said?' Therefore are there continuing the anomalies and, injustices which abound in the laws of divorce, and which it was the purpose of the commission to remove.
The Royal Commission on Licensing published; in 1932, an extremely interesting and valuable report. ".'We regard the problem of the registered club" it said, "as- one of the most important of the subjects of our enquiry . . . We are satisfied that substantial changes in the - law are . indispensable." That, -too, has found its way to. the graveyard of bleaching reports. Mean- time, the evils at which -it aimed grow • apace. Chief Constables of all the bigeities, the Commissioner of Police for the Metropolis, magistrates and social workers. all- inveigh against the bogus clubs that flourish and wax fat.
The scandals connected with what is known as the Poor Man's Insurance were such that a committee was appointed to consider them over four years ago. Sir Benjamin Cohen was its chairman, and be and his fellow- members discovered Many unsavoury facts. They de- clared that at the end of 1932 there were in existence more than -84,000,000 policies, involving an aggregate sum assured of £1,250,000,000—and a premium income of £57,300,000. The methods by which the pence of the poor are extracted, the forfeiture of policies, the excessive amounts taken by directors, and other -abuses, were ex- posed. - and recommendations made for amendments of the law. That report lies forgotten in the cemetery.
• Some time ago, a distinguished committee made practical proposals for the reform of the Coroner's Court. But nothing has been done since. And the gross mistakes and antiquated procedure of this court continue unabated.
Another committee informed us over a year ago of the urgent need for the reorganisation of the system—if it is a system—of helping prisoners upon their discharge. Humane and workmanlike suggestions were made—yet, alas, while the dust accumulates upon the report in the archives of the Home Office, human wreckage is being disgorged by our prisons into a world that is without hope or helping hand. Little wonder that the Lord Chief Justice-should recently condemn in unmeasured terms the shameful callousness. that we show to these men and women, or that, about the same time, the Recorder of London should call the public -" hypocrites " in this matter. All because of a dissection and interment !
Something like 15,000 orders of separation or main- tenance are made by the magistrates annually. Under some of. them, over the last few years 2,500 men have gone to prison for default in respect of the payments due from them.- -To save-the wholesale break-up of homes by these matrimonial disputes, a 'Departmental Committee Was appointed- in- 1934. It sat for 15 months, and then made certain proposals. It is true that their report is not yet more than a few months old—but, apparently, it is to meet the fate of the others.- Nothing is now heard of it—not even the mourning of its friends ; and the 182 pages of the Report of the Departmental Committee on the Social Services in Courts of Summary Jurisdiction will (according to present appearances) become the tombstone over- the grave of a projected reform.
The alarming and ever-growing increase in juvenile Crime is the theme of grave statements by the Chief Constables all over the country. The 80 Approved Schools, and all the Remand Homes are overcrowded. What to do with young delinquents is a problem that is baffling the magistrates. Upon those Approved Schools a Committee reported some time ago. Their report revealed a scandalous state of affairs. Only 18 of the Schools are provided by local authorities; all the others are maintained by charitable bodies. The contributions are diminishing, and the managers, says the report, are " sometimes 'compelled to overwork their boys and girb, and to exercise economy often at the expense of efficiency." The committee found that the standards generally at the schools are low, and the staffs poorly paid and badly qualified for the work. A vital and clamant question, this. It will, I suppose, remain in the charnel-house.
- These are but a few instances, chosen more or less at random, of the way in which matters that intimately affect the everyday lives of the common people are swathed in red-tape for shroud. And when " No parlia- mentary time" is given as the reason for inaction, one is inclined to contemplate -the fate that would overtake a business the directors of which said they had no time to adopt measures calculated to preserve its solvency and to increase its profits.
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