Debate on The Poor Relief Act

Official report · Assembly of SchwartzistanSession 1904 · col. 9317

The Speaker: The House will come to order. The Bill stands for its third reading. The Minister.

Josef Marrow (Minister of the Interior): I move the third reading. The Bill gives the towns a duty and an officer to carry it out. The Ministry of the Interior has the forms ready. The printed Bill says it better than I can: Every town above 500 inhabitants must appoint an officer under this Act. The Bill is in the hands of the House.

Rainer Mauker (The Ostrand; The Reed Party): Mr. Speaker, In The Ostrand, which I have the honour to sit for, the Bill will be read at the market cross and understood by half. I ask the Minister one thing: does the Bill send an officer out to the farms, and if it does, who feeds him? The material provision is this: Every town above 500 inhabitants must appoint an officer under this Act. I ask the House to note it. The towns asked for it. The towns will pay for it. That is the usual arrangement and I do not quarrel with it. My party will divide the House on the Bill. [Hear, hear.]

Josef Ziler (The Ostrand; The Assembly Union): Sir, The Union stands where it has always stood: for the towns, for the trade, and against any clause that begins with the word 'licence'. Drains, roads and lamps. The House will pass the Bill because the alternative is drains, roads and no lamps. The members for The Ostrand have met and are of one mind on the Bill, which does not happen often. I support the Bill, with the reservation I have stated. [Hear, hear.]

Magnus Dellberg (The Sudmark; The Reed Party): Mr. Speaker, I sit for The Sudmark. The clerks there are few and the roads are long, and any officer the Bill appoints will spend a week finding the houses. The land pays for everything in the end. The Reed Party will vote as the land would vote if it could. I have the Bill before me and the House has it before it. An officer under the Act: the phrase appears in every Bill from the Interior and means a man with a book and a bicycle. We shall divide the House. [Interruption.]

Ulrik Hauk (Kesselhöh; The Continuity Party): Sir, Order and record. That is the whole of my party's programme and I do not apologise for its shortness. The members for Kesselhöh have met and are of one mind on the Bill, which does not happen often. The towns asked for it. The towns will pay for it. That is the usual arrangement and I do not quarrel with it. I have the Bill before me and the House has it before it. I shall vote against the Bill.

The Minister replied briefly. The fee was as printed; the officer was as printed; the House had the Bill and could read it.

The Speaker: The question is that the Bill be now read a third time and do pass. As many as are of that opinion say Aye. [Ayes.] Of the contrary, No. [Noes.] A division was claimed.

The tellers reported the numbers to the Chair. The Speaker declared the Bill passed.

The House then proceeded to the next Order of the Day.