The advantages of such a system of voluntary workers, acting in connection with, and under the guidance of, the Local Authority are many. The volunteer worker, as has often been pointed out, can bring to bear on individual cases a patience and an enthusiasm which the official has no time to bestow. By getting into friendly relations with the mother, the volunteer visitor will often be able to help the family in numberless ways. The Care Committee system represents, indeed, one of the most hopeful movements of the time, denoting, as it does, an awakening of the social conscience and a revolt against the old system of district visiting, which meant too frequently merely the giving of a dole, a system which encouraged a patronising attitude on the one hand, and a cadging habit on the other. From the Care Committee visitor little in the way of material gifts is to be expected. Instead, some effort is demanded from the parent. He, or more usually she, is asked to co-operate with the Care Committee in doing what is necessary for the child's welfare. Moreover, the Care Committee is invaluable as a means of educating public opinion. Many will be found who, though perhaps strongly opposed in theory to the whole system of the provision of free meals, are yet willing to work for the children, and by contact with the children and their homes will learn something of the life and struggles of the poor, and a better mutual understanding will be brought about. As the Warden of a Settlement in Liverpool has pointed out, "it is a constant lament of administrators of education that the public care more for saving the rates than making citizens. The complaint is justified. We only care about what we understand; the public understands the money it has to pay, but it does not understand what happens to it. As a matter of fact ninety per cent. of the ratepaying public have never been at a feeding centre or seen a medical inspection; and their own education was of such a scanty nature that one cannot expect their general imagination to supply the deficiency. Hence they grumble at paying for a service of which they are ignorant. The remedy lies in making them understand. From the young men and women of these families we can recruit Care Committee workers. They will visit the homes of the people, the feeding centres and the school; their imagination will be stirred and their intellects quickened; finally, the time will come when an enlightened public opinion will be the critic of the education policy of our city."[419] Splendid work is now being done in many parts of London by the Care Committees and it is greatly to be regretted that the system has not been more widely adopted in the provinces. Footnote 419: "Care Committee Work in Liverpool," by F. J. Marquis, in the _School Child_, September, 1913, p. 11.