Poor Relief - Law Commission

over poor children until they reach 16, whereupon they may be
apprenticed for a period not exceeding 7 years
(e) court authorised to punish the misbehaviour of any poor person in
Corporation premises
(f) Corporation authorised to assess the sum required to build and fit out a
hospital or workhouse, such sum (not exceeding £2000) to be raised
over a 5 year period; Corporation also authorised to assess the weekly or
monthly sum required to maintain the poor in such hospital or workhouse,
such sum not to exceed the sums paid by the City to maintain the poor in
the last 3 years; all such sums to be raised by taxation of every inhabitant
in the City; churchwardens and overseers authorised to collect the tax;
penalty for non-payment; appeals against assessment
(g) procedure for the Corporation collecting the taxes itself in the event of
delay; penalties for bureaucratic delay
(h) Corporation authorised to confer the status of Guardian on anyone
making donations of £50 or more to the Corporation
(i) Corporation to be responsible for the care and maintenance of all the
poor of the City except in cases where the poor were already sufficiently
provided for; power to apprehend vagrants or beggars and set them to
work in the workhouse for a period not exceeding three years; this Act
not to affect almshouses, hospitals or other charitable donations made
within the City
(j) Corporation authorised to employ such officers as are necessary for the
running of the Corporation’s premises
(k) accounts of the Corporation to be kept and made available for inspection;
penalty for neglect or refusal to produce accounts
(l) penalties imposed by this Act to be recoverable by seizure of the
offender’s goods
(m) all charitable gifts given in the future for the use of the City or any parish
in it were to be paid to the Corporation for the uses of the poor of the City
(n) civil procedure; status of Act
(o) authorised the Mayor, Aldermen and citizens of the City to use market toll
receipts to promote employment schemes for the poor.
4. It is unclear whether any workhouse was eventually built in Hereford pursuant
to the 1697 Act. It seems that, by the 1770s, five of the City’s parishes were
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