The Guild of Help and the changing face of Edwardian philanthropy

The Guild of Help was formed at Bradford in 1904 with the idea of introducing a new, more community-based, approach to deal with the increasingly important problem of poverty. It emerged to overcome the failures of charity and the threat of increased state intervention, seeking instead to get all the community to take responsibility for the poor. The movement spread rapidly and soon became a major constituent of voluntary urban relief in Britain. Yet, in the end, its community approach failed, largely because solving the problem of poverty was well beyond its means, and intent, but also because it was unable to draw the churches, the working classes and charities into working with the well-regulated system of help for the poor which it envisaged.