At Leicester again, nothing appears to be done in those cases where the child needs food but the parent refuses to apply. And such cases appear to be frequent. We were told by the vicar of a very poor parish that numbers of the parents would not make the necessary application. This evidence seems to be borne out by a comparison of the numbers of cases helped by the Distress Committee and the Canteen Committee. In 1910, for instance, it was found that on September 30, 607 married men and widowers, having 1,145 children wholly, and 214 partly, dependent upon them, were registered at the Labour Bureau as unemployed.[225] These numbers were, of course, not a complete index of the unemployment in the town. But, turning to the report of the Canteen Committee, we find that on the same date only 105 children were being helped.[226] The great discrepancy between these figures seems to point to the fact that the Canteen Committee had not discovered all the cases of children who were suffering from want of food. Footnote 225: _Leicester Pioneer_, October 29, 1910. Footnote 226: Quarterly Report of the Leicester Children's Aid Association, July 1 to September 30, 1910. The failure of the parents to apply may in some cases be due to laziness and disregard for their children's welfare. Or it may be that they are too sensitive to ask for help. Or again it may be difficult or impossible for them to attend at the time named. The hour is usually fixed so as to be that most convenient for the parents, but it is impossible, of course, to fix a time which will suit all. At Birmingham cases have even occurred "where the father has been obliged to pay tram fares in order to arrive in time to prove his inability to feed his children"![227] Footnote 227: _The Public Feeding of Elementary School Children_, by Phyllis D. Winder, 1913, p. 29.