Champions for Children: The Lives of Modern Child Care Pioneers

233 Pages·2001·1.17 MB·English

by  Bob Holman

CHAMPIONS FOR
CHILDREN
The lives of modern
child care pioneers
Bob Holman
(cid:1)(cid:2)(cid:3)•POLICY
P
P
P R E S S
First published in Great Britain in October 2001 by
The Policy Press
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Bristol BS8 1PY
UK
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Design and production of text and cover © The Policy Press 2001
Text © Bob Holman 2001
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
ISBN 978 186134 353 6
Bob Holman is a voluntary neighbourhood worker and Visiting Professor in
Social Policy at the Universities of Glasgow and Swansea.
Front cover: Photograph kindly supplied by Mark Simmons Photography, Bristol.
Cover design by Qube Design Associates, Bristol.
The right of Bob Holman to be identified as author of this work has been asserted
by him in accordance with the 1988 Copyright, Designs and Patents Act.
All rights reserved: no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a
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The statements and opinions contained within this publication are solely those
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Press. The University of Bristol and The Policy Press disclaim responsibility for
any injury to persons or property resulting from any material published in this
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The Policy Press works to counter discrimination on grounds of gender, race,
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Printed and bound in Great Britain by Hobbs the Printers Ltd, Southampton.
Contents
Preface iv
Acknowledgements vi
one Eleanor Rathbone (1872-1946) 1
two Marjory Allen (1897-1976) 23
three Barbara Kahan (1920-2000) 49
four John Stroud (1923-89) 75
five Clare Winnicott (1906-84) 99
six Peter Townsend (1928- ) 127
seven Bob Holman (1936- ): A child care participant living
through the changes 157
eight Past, present and future 191
Bibliography 205
Index 215
iii
Champions for children
Preface
The 1940s to 1960s could be called a golden age of child care: the 1940s
witnessed public concern about children ‘deprived of a normal home
life’, which led to the government establishing the first local authority
service, the Children’s Departments, to offer specialised help to such
children. In the 1950s the employees of these departments struggled
successfully to build up children’s services. The 1960s were marked by a
further expansion of the Children’s Departments as their skilled staff were
given even wider duties in regard to the children’s own parents and to
young offenders. The 1960s also witnessed studies which established the
fact that family poverty had not been abolished by the welfare state.
The Children’s Departments were founded and run by a remarkable
set of people. Many of them outlasted the departments which were
amalgamated into social services departments (social work departments
in Scotland) by 1971. A few continue in active service until this very day.
It appears to me that social work students now know very little about
these champions for children. Some of these champions also backed
social reformers who continued to highlight child poverty. The latter are
also champions for children.
My intention in this book is to record and so preserve the characters
and deeds of six of these champions. I could have chosen many more,
had space allowed. The six selected represent politicians, campaigners,
children’s officers, writers and researchers. My choice is shaped by the
fact that I have known or at least met these champions. The exception is
Eleanor Rathbone, who died in 1946, but I consider her efforts to combat
child poverty so important to the children of subsequent years that she
had to have the initial chapter. Furthermore, I feel I almost knew Eleanor
through our mutual friend, Margaret Simey.
At first glance, it might appear that the six champions divide into two
groups: Eleanor Rathbone and Peter Townsend, who strove to abolish
child poverty, and Marjory Allen, Barbara Kahan, John Stroud and Clare
Winnicott, who developed services for children deprived of satisfactory
lives with their own parents. In fact, there was always an overlap. Eleanor
Rathbone witnessed abject poverty in Liverpool but later she became
concerned about the quality of the home life of children whose fathers
spent long periods away in the armed forces or the Merchant Navy.
Marjory Allen was dismayed at the lack of personal care for children in
iv
Preface
children’s homes, but she also noted that they suffered low material
standards. Barbara Kahan forged an effective Children’s Department which
improved the treatment of children in public care, but she also campaigned
for a reduction in poverty which would allow more children to remain
with their parents. John Stroud’s career direction was shaped by the
poverty he saw in India but it was expressed both in writing about and in
serving children who were separated from their parents. Clare Winnicott
was deeply stirred by the material suffering of children in the 1930s, yet
her main contribution was to be in the training of child care officers.
Peter Townsend is internationally recognised as a campaigner against child
poverty but it is less well known that his own experiences as a child in a
lone-parent family shaped his values. The six children’s champions came
from very different backgrounds and include a titled lady and wealthy
politician plus the children of a railway worker, a Baptist minister, a local
government official and an actress. Yet, from their varied lives, two themes
appear in common. First, that central government had to accept
responsibility for dealing with child poverty. It was not sufficient to leave
it to employers, voluntary agencies or the charity of individuals. Second,
that local government should be the provider of a high quality service for
deprived children. This was not to dismiss the contribution of voluntary
services, but was rather a recognition that only local authorities could
ensure a coverage of such services throughout the country. These two
themes will appear again and again throughout the book. They are not
entirely separate, for the champions perceived that poverty was a major
factor in undermining family life.
My original proposal for this book concerned just the notables in the
first six chapters. However, I was persuaded to write something about
my own lifetime in child care. I do so reluctantly, for I am a pygmy
alongside these giants. However, I hope that my story will provide an
overview of the developments in child care from the 1940s to the present,
along with some suggestions as to where developments in child care
might go in the future.
v
Champions for children
Acknowledgements
The manuscript of this book was completed on time and accepted by a
publisher early in 2000. Then came the writer’s nightmare. The publisher
had cash flow problems and announced that publication was postponed
indefinitely. Fortunately, The Policy Press came to the rescue and it has
been a pleasure to work with its team, especially Dawn Louise Rushen.
I wish to thank a number of people – some of whom are also children’s
champions in their own right – who have allowed me to interview them
about the subjects of the book. I thank Keith Bilton, David Donnison,
Frank Field, Ruth Lister, Jean Packman, Roy Parker, Brian Roycroft,
Margaret Simey, Daphne Statham, Nick Stroud, Daphne Stroud and Sylvia
Watson. George and Janie Thomas and David Bull kindly wrote to me. I
also thank Barbara Kahan and Peter Townsend for allowing me to interview
them about themselves. Unfortunately, Barbara died in August 2000, but
I am pleased that she saw and approved the chapter about herself. Joel
Kanter kindly let me see some of his drafts about Clare and Donald
Winnicott which he is preparing for publication. Gary Williams of the
Qualitative Data Archival Resource Centre at Essex University was most
helpful in making available to me material about Peter Townsend and, in
particular, Paul Thompson’s Life Story Interview with Peter. Terry Philpot
the editor-in-chief of Community Care, Jane Tunstill of the University of
London, Margaret Hogan of the National Institute for Social Work and
Nicola Hilliard of the National Children’s Bureau, were also a source of
encouragement. Above all, I wish to thank Annette to whom I am glad
to have been married for 38 years.
I can only hope that the 21st century will be graced with children’s
champions who possess the skills, compassion and commitment of the
six described in these pages.
vi
ONE
Eleanor Rathbone, 1872-1946
Photograph of Eleanor
Rathbone, kindly supplied by
University of Liverpool
Library, Special Collections
and Archives
She never had children, and never married. She came from a wealthy
family and never lived alongside poor families. Yet she devoted much of
her life to improving their material conditions by campaigning for children’s
allowances to be paid directly to mothers. The woman was Eleanor
Rathbone and, just before she died, she contributed in the House of
Commons to the enactment of the 1945 Family Allowances Act which,
Hilary Land stated, “was probably the most notable personal triumph in
legislation since the Act which celebrates the Plimsoll line” (Land, 1990, p
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Champions for children
104). This chapter will attempt to trace how a privileged Victorian woman
became a children’s champion. Much of its content is drawn from an
interview with Margaret Simey. Margaret was a friend of Eleanor Rathbone’s
and is now a distinguished elder stateswoman of social reform. In 1924,
Margaret was one of the first degree students at Liverpool University in
the School of Social Sciences, of which Eleanor was one of the founders.
While there, Margaret went on placement to the Victoria Women’s
Settlement which was the base for much of Eleanor Rathbone’s work.
Thereafter, Margaret was associated with the same causes until Eleanor’s
death in 1946.
The Rathbone tradition
Eleanor Rathbone was born in 1872 to a family which was famous in
Liverpool and beyond for its money and mercy. Her father, William
Rathbone, multiplied the family fortunes in the China tea trade. A devoted
Christian of the Unitarian church, he took seriously his duty to help
others. Indeed, he regarded his money as something entrusted to him by
God for the service of humankind. Later, when Eleanor wrote his biography,
she called his life “a career of public usefulness” (Rathbone, 1905, p 493).
It was a career helped by a tremendous drive, a kind of faith that almost
anything could be achieved. He supported and founded charities in
Liverpool, was a city councillor and then a Liberal MP. Married twice,
William had eight sons and three daughters. The expectation was that his
sons would take over their father’s many roles. However, the sons never
lived up to the standards he set in business and social life and, as Eleanor
grew up, so her father increasingly prepared her to take on his charitable
and political mantles.
They were mantles which Eleanor readily put on. Although she never
identified with Christianity in the way that her father had, Eleanor believed
that it was a heritage from him to use both her material and personal
resources to benefit society. Margaret Simey wrote that her sense of social
obligation was so sharp as “to be almost literally painful” (Simey, 1974, p 5).
The direction she took led to some conflict with her mother, Emily.
Emily Rathbone was no Victorian doormat and had encouraged Eleanor
to develop wide interests as she was educated at home. Nonetheless, she
expected Eleanor to marry and, as Susan Pedersen explains in an article
which informs this and the following paragraph, insisted that, at the age of
18, she should enter “the marriage market of the London season” (Pedersen,
1996).
2
Eleanor Rathbone
Despite her lack of formal education, Eleanor was clearly very intelligent
and wanted to go to university. Her father was enthusiastic, her mother
less so. She proceeded in 1893 to study philosophy at Somerville College,
Oxford. Here she “found a group of liberal dons eager to win a new female
audience for their philosophical creed of redemption through social service,
and a community of single women able to offer the emotional sustenance
she had been so long without” and she returned to the family home in
1896 “committed to the single life and able to cast her own quest for
independence as part of a broader imperative towards selfless female action”
(Pederson, 1996). Margaret Simey said, “Eleanor was not anti-men, just
anti-marriage” and explained to me that Eleanor was not prepared to
undergo the restrictions placed on women by Victorian marriage (Simey,
1999, interview with author). She also pointed out the influence on
Eleanor, at this time, of Professor John MacCunn, a Scot who had come
to Liverpool University as Professor of Moral Philosophy in 1881. MacCunn
taught that for anyone to have to live a life of poverty and squalor was an
offence against their dignity as citizens and a waste of their potential. It
was the duty of other citizens to emancipate the poor, both for their own
sake and for the good of society. He declared in a public lecture that “the
purpose of social work is to emancipate the poor from oppression” (Simey,
1999, interview). MacCunn had faith in all people, in the potential of
poor people and in the abilities of others to bring about change. His
beliefs reinforced and enlarged the philosophy of Eleanor Rathbone.
Early activities
William persuaded his daughter both to volunteer as a friendly visitor for
the Central Relief Society and also to undertake a study of one of his
great concerns, the nature and effects of casual labour in the docks. By
the time William died in 1902, Eleanor was establishing her own ideas.
She was not impressed with the amateurish approach of some of the
visitors at the Central Relief Society and gravitated to the Victoria Women’s
Settlement, founded in 1897 with, almost inevitably, two Rathbones on
the committee. Here she met its young warden, Elizabeth Macadam.
Mary Stocks, a close colleague of Eleanor and author of her biography,
commented, “Elizabeth Macadam became in due course the friend and
companion of Eleanor’s existence until death did them part, and at no
subsequent period was Eleanor lonely” (Stocks, 1949, p 58). Eleanor
became the Settlement’s honorary secretary and with Elizabeth they built
it up as a centre for women’s work, social activity and social work training.
3