But the basis of the idea of amalgamating parishes into Unions owes a lot to Chadwick although some unions do pre-date the Poor Law Amendment Act.
Where their boundaries crosses county borders this was usually to create more efficient and sensible unions.
Some landlords were a little naughty in how they did things but was this a general thing?
There were very few PLU with detached parishes and where you did this reflected the unfortunate powers of local landowners and a government which was not prepared to take the toguth decisions which were needed.
David
----
Dr David Alan Gatley
Senior Lecturer, Sociology
Faculty of Arts and Creative Technologies
Staffordshire University
College Road
Stoke-on-Trent
ST4 2DE
________________________________________
From: From: Local-History list [[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Peter Higginbotham [[log in to unmask]]
Sent: 02 December 2013 15:09
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: [LOCAL-HISTORY] Yorkshire/Lancs boundary
Edwin Chadwick didn't create PLUs. Their boundaries were arrived at by
on-the-ground negotiation between Assistant Poor Law Commissioners and local
officials and land-owners. The desires of the latter to have all their land
within a single union to maximise their sway sometimes resulted in some rather
strange and inefficient configurations. PLU boundaries, based on the boundaries
of their member parishes, were often pretty messy, often crossing county
boundaries and having detached portions of one union isolated inside another.
Peter Higginbotham
On 02/12/2013 14:54, GATLEY David wrote:
> The irony of all this is that way back in the 1830s and early 1840s Edwin Chadwick created the basis of a far more efficient system and democratic form of local government when he created the Poor Law Unions. Had the existing counties then been abolished and the Poor Law Unions given responsibility for all local government services, and the franchise extended to include all males and females aged over 14 then we would all be a lot better off today. In deed I do wonder if this was what Edwin Chadwick wanted to do. As it was the Poor Law Unions were given responsibility for vital registration (hence they were also known as Registration Districts) and some powers over sanitation. Sadly Chadwick's achievements were thrown out in the 1880s in favour of a system of local government based on the ancient counties and boroughs, although the areas of many rural district councils coincided with the old Poor Law Unions.
>
> Incidentally the 1851, 1861 and 1871 Censuses include statistical tables for Registration Counties, which were groups of Poor Law Unions which roughly corresponded to the ancient counties.
>
> Here endeth the lecture! :-)
>
> David
> ----
> Dr David Alan Gatley
> Senior Lecturer, Sociology
> Faculty of Arts and Creative Technologies
> Staffordshire University
> College Road
> Stoke-on-Trent
> ST4 2DE
> ________________________________________
> From: From: Local-History list [[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Nick Hudd [[log in to unmask]]
> Sent: 02 December 2013 14:31
> To: [log in to unmask]
> Subject: Re: [LOCAL-HISTORY] Yorkshire/Lancs boundary
>
> If you look at the history of diocesan boundaries, which I suppose are in some ways comparable as an organisational concept, you find that they have not been immutable, though it is often assumed that they have been
>
> Nick Hudd
>
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All best wishes,
Peter Higginbotham
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