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News

News Archives: Index

October 7, 2010: Probation Set For Industrial Action

October 5, 2010: Turning Prisoners Into Taxpayers

October 4, 2010: Murder Changes Now In Force

September 20, 2010: Probation Programmes Face Cuts

August 24, 2010: Victorian Poor Law Records Online

August 10, 2010: Justice Job Cuts

July 28, 2010: Prison Violence Growing

July 22, 2010: Police Numbers: Latest Figures

July 22, 2010: New Jurisdiction Rules

July 16, 2010: CCJS On Prison And Probation Spending Under Labour

July 15, 2010: Latest Statistics On Violent And Sexual Crime

July 15, 2010: Latest National Crime Figures

July 15, 2010: New Chief Prisons Inspector

July 14, 2010: Hard Times Ahead For Prisons: Anne Owers

July 14, 2010: Prison Does Not Work: Ken Clarke

July 13, 2010: Criminal Justice Reform: Sentencing and Rehabilitation

July 13, 2010: Criminal Justice Reform Priorities

July 12, 2010: What Price Public Protection, Asks Probation Chief Inspector

July 12, 2010: NOMS has failed, says Napo

July 10, 2010: IPCC To Investigate Death of Raoul Moat

July 9, 2010: Women In Prison: New Report

July 9, 2009: Unjust Deserts: Imprisonment for Public Protection

July 8, 2010: Police Search Powers Change

July 7, 2010: Make 'Legal High' Illegal, Says ACMD

July 2, 2010: Failing Children In Prison

July 2, 2010: Police Buried Under a Blizzard of Guidance: HMIC

July 1, 2010: Freedom To Change The Law?

June 30, 2010: A New Outlook On Penal Reform?

June 30, 2010: Revolving Door Of Offending Must Stop, Says Clarke

June 30, 2010: Ken Clarke: Speech on Criminal Justice Reform

June 29, 2010: No More Police Targets

June 26, 2010: Family Intervention Projects Questioned

June 25, 2010: Cutting Criminal Justice

June 24, 2010: Napo on Sex Offenders Report

June 23, 2010: Closing Courts: The Cuts Begin

June 23, 2010: Strategy To Tackle Gangs

June 15, 2010: Courts and Mentally Disordered Offenders

June 8, 2010: Working With Muslims in Prison

June 1, 2010: Your Chance To Nominate a QC

August 24, 2010: Victorian Poor Law Records Online

Anyone studying crime and criminology will be interested to learn that over 115,000 web pages about the Victorian workhouse and poor law records are now available online. thanks to the National Archives.

The collection of records, Living the Poor Life, will help academics answer questions about what life was like for the Victorian poor. The project involved more than 200 volunteers, including local and family historians researching and cataloguing the records of 21 Poor Law Unions, from Berwick upon Tweed in the North to Truro in the South-West.

Dr Paul Carter, Project Director and Principal Modern Records Specialist at The National Archives said:

'The importance of this series of records cannot be overestimated. 'The records cover all aspects of poor relief, but also cover matters such as opposition to the workhouse system, industrial strikes, Chartism, wages, treatment of children and much more. They are essential for any study of Victorian life.'

An unrivalled source of raw history, the records contain individual letters, reports and memos that reveal problems from family breakdown, corruption and blackmail, to fraud, violence and neglect. The records can be very detailed and include letters expressing anger and distress at the plight of unemployed labourers who have been refused relief.

The National Archives is a government department and an executive agency of the Ministry of Justice. It brings together the Public Record Office, Historical Manuscripts Commission, the Office of Public Sector Information and Her Majesty's Stationery Office.