The 1830s saw a profound change in welfare structures, with the introduction of the New Poor Law and the assessment of existing charity provision by the Charity Commissioners. A new network of charitable elites emerged, who in effect took over from the Poor Law administrators as arbiters of respectability of the poor and of their need within a local community. Regulated charity was an important part of the Victorian welfare system, with the middle and upper classes benevolently helping those not so fortunate, but only those who were perceived to be deserving. The idea of self-help was also increasingly fundamental to charitable provision, whether in monetary contributions to a club or by receiving instruction in sewing, for future self-reliance. Such self-help initiatives sought to discourage dependence on welfare provision but were counter to the way that some poor had regarded their right to parish relief.

The evidence for charity in rural and urban areas largely comes from information gathered during the Charity Commissioners' surveys of the 1830s. The charities investigated by the Commissioners were the formal charities supported by a bequest. Evidence for informal charity remains extremely sparse. The fact that so many clothing charities and societies were established around 1819 and 1820 suggests that the depression and economic downturn after the end of the Napoleonic Wars had a profound effect on the lower classes, particularly in urban areas; or at least, that the poverty had become so pronounced by this date that the elite could no longer ignore it.