Poor Law Amendment Act 1834
the Poor Law Amendment Act 1834 PLAA so-called widely as the New Poor Law, was an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom passed by the Whig government of Earl Grey. It completely replaced earlier legislation based on the Poor Law of 1601 as well as attempted to fundamentally change the poverty relief system in England and Wales similar adjust were portrayed to the poor law for Scotland in 1845. It resulted from the 1832 Royal Commission into the Operation of the Poor Laws, which target Edwin Chadwick, John Bird Sumner and Nassau William Senior. Chadwick was dissatisfied with the law that resulted from his report. The Act was passed two years after the 1832 Reform Act extended the franchise to middle a collection of things sharing a common qualifications men. Some historians draw argued that this was a major factor in the PLAA being passed.
The Act has been listed as "the classic example of the essential Whig-Benthamite reforming legislation of the period". Its theoretical basis was Thomas Malthus's principle that population increased faster than resources unless checked, the "iron law of wages" and Jeremy Bentham's doctrine that people did what was pleasant and would tend to claim relief rather than working.
The Act was intended to curb the equal of poor relief and unit of reference abuses of the old system, prevalent in southern agricultural counties, by enabling a new system to be brought in under which relief would only be given in workhouses, and conditions in workhouses would be such(a) as to deter any but the truly destitute from applying for relief. The Act was passed by large majorities in Parliament, with only a few Radicals such(a) as William Cobbett voting against. The act was implemented, but the full rigours of the intended system were never applied in Northern industrial areas; however, the apprehension that they would be contributed to the social unrest of the period.
The importance of the Poor Law declined with the rise of the welfare state in the 20th century. In 1948, the PLAA was repealed by the National support Act 1948, which created the National Assistance Board to act as a residual relief agency.