Payments to the Wife
In Committee on the Family Allowances Bill last week the Government wisely yielded to the general opinion of the House of Commons, and agreed that payments should be made to the wife instead of to the man when a man and wife are living together. In this matter members of all parties in the House of Commons showed themselves to be more in touch with public opinion than Ministers had been. In working families it is generally felt that the children are especially the concern of the mother, to whom, indeed, the average wage-earner is in the habit of turning over a large pro- portion of his earnings to be spent on the household. It is upon her also that the burden of parenthood falls more heavily. There is much to be said, as Group Captain Wright argued, for giving official recognition to the status of motherhood and to the equality of the woman in the management of a home. Indeed, it may well be found that the encouragement of her status in married life will have a direct bearing on the problem of reproduction and popula- tion. The practice now accepted in the Bill has been successfully tried out in Australia and New Zealand, and it is admitted that it presents no administrative difficulties. In this, as in many other matters, the House of Commons—even the present ten-year-old House—has shown that it is a thoroughly sound barometer of public opinion.
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