Union Chargeability Act 1865

The Union Chargeability Act 1865 (28 & 29 Vict. c. 79) was an act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom that was passed after the Poor Law Amendment Act 1834. The intention of the act was to broaden the base of funding for relief provided by the Poor Laws.

History
Following the passage of the new poor law in 1834 problems emerged with the financing of the relief for the poor provided in that act.

Although the intention of the New Poor Law was to aggregate parishes into unions among which financial burden of building expensive workhouses was pooled, liability to the union was based on the composition of the parish. Some parishes were able to escape financial liability by organizing into "close" parishes with a minimum of labourer-residents. In this way, the financial burden of the poor fell mainly on "open" parishes.

The Union Chargeability Act 1865 was thus passed so that the financial burden of paupers was shared more equally on a union-wide basis.

The debate was contentious, with complaints centered around the issues of settlement and removal. A proposal was made to reduce the requirements to be given relief in a place where the labourer had lived, rather than removing them to their prior place of comicile. This was deemed unacceptable, as it was claimed the poor would travel to large cities in order to avail themselves of relief. Removal of these proposed amendments finally allowed the bill to be passed on 15 May 1865.