should at once place all destitute Belgian refugees on the footing of
prisoners of war, except that we need not post sentries to shoot them if
they try to escape, nor surround them with barbed wire. Indeed these
precautions are necessary in the case of the Germans rather to save
their sense of honour whilst remaining here than to defeat any very
strong longing on their part to return to the trenches.

In a reasonable state of society there would be another difference. The
Belgians would offer to work so as not to be a burden to us; whilst the
German prisoner would say--as he actually does, by the way--"No: I am
not here by my own will: if you open the door I shall go home and take
myself off your hands; so I am in no way bound to work for you." As it
is, our Trade Unions are up in arms at the slightest hint of either
Belgian or German labour being employed when there is no shortage of
English labour!"


*The Minority Report*.

All this exasperating anomaly and deadlock and breakdown would disappear
if we had a proper system of provision for our own unemployed civilians
(there are no unemployed soldiers: we do not discharge them between the
battles). The Belgians would have found an organization of unemployment
ready for them, and would have been provided for with our own
unemployed, not as refugees, but simply as unemployed. How to do that
need not be explained here. The problem was worked out by one of the
hardest bits of thinking yet done in the Socialist movement, and set
forth in the Minority Report of the Royal Commission on the Poor Laws
and the Relief of Distress, 1909. Our helplessness in the present
emergency shews how very unwise we were to shelve that report.