[2] Friendly societies paid de facto old-age pensions in the form of sickness benefit, and the Act defined "old age" as 50 and above.

[3] The act allowed friendly societies considerable self-management "but insured the adoption of sound rules, effective audit, and rates of payment sufficient to maintain solvency.

[5] In 1870, a Royal Commission was appointed to inquire into the working of friendly societies, making a report with recommendations for further consolidation and amendment.

[6] Leave to bring in the Friendly Societies Bill was granted to the Chancellor of the Exchequer, Stafford Northcote MP, the Home Secretary, R. A.

[10] In 1889 Mr Braxton Hicks, the London coroner, wrote a letter to The Times about the dangers of child life insurance.

He wrote that the insurances act as a temptation to the parents to neglect them, or to feed them with improper food, and sometimes even to kill them, as in the excessively numerous cases of "over-laying" or suffocating in bed.