 Shelter and food for the destitute was provided locally by committees of landowners and clerics and varied from one area to another.Funding for this came from the Rates, a local property tax, which became higher with increasing poverty.In 1830 an outbreak of civil unrest by desperate agricultural workers, the Swing Riots, occurred in southern England, prompting the wealthy to look for a way of losing some of the surplus population, especially the more troublesome members, through emigration.