Headed by the Fabian socialist Beatrice Webb, it called for a system that was radically different from the existing Poor Law.
She, amongst the others heading the report, who included George Lansbury, felt that it was shortsighted of society to expect paupers to be entirely accountable for themselves.
Beatrice Webb wrote that its purpose was "to secure a national minimum of civilised life ... open to all alike, of both sexes and all classes, by which we meant sufficient nourishment and training when young, a living wage when able-bodied, treatment when sick, and modest but secure livelihood when disabled or aged".
Historian Jose Harris,[1] the biographer of William Beveridge, has written that "in historical accounts of modern social policy, the Royal Commission – and in particular its famous Minority Report – has often been closely twinned with the Beveridge Plan of 1942 as one of the two most seminal public enquiries into the working of British social policy over the last hundred years",[2] noting that the Minority Report has often been cited as one of the first descriptions of a modern welfare state.
A Guardian editorial in 2009, marking the centenary of the Minority Report, wrote that "the seed that was to grow into the welfare state was planted [in the Minority Report] ... Workhouses lingered on in various forms and the poor law itself lasted until 1948 – but Beatrice had already written its obituary in 1909".