The Evening Star: WITH WHICH ARE INCORPORATED The Evening News, Morning News, and Echo. THURSDAY, JANUARY 29, 1891.

Auckland Star, Volume XXII, Issue 24, 29 January 1891, Page 2

The Evening Star: WITH WHICH ARE INCORPORATED The Evening News, Morning News, and Echo.

THURSDAY, JANUARY 29, 1891.

For the cause that lacks aEsistaccs, For the -wrong that needs resistance, ?or the future in the distance, And the gooa that we can do.

Public benevolence is spasmodic, and usually follows an erratic course. The

response to an appeal for assistance

depends very often more upon the manner in which it is stated ar.d pressed upon public notice than upon the deserving nature of the object, and while it often happens that even a deserving cause well stated fails to

elicit adequate response, at other times public sympathy is so deeply stirred that the contributions are in excess of the exigencies of the case,

We have examples illustrating these premises in the outpouring of popular generosity on the occasion of the Kaitangata colliery accident, and the meagre response that has so far been made to the appeal on behalf of the sufferers by the colliery accident at ,F"in*'y. It is true that the magnitude ot the Kaitangata catastrophe appealed in an especial degree to the feelings of human pity, but the widows and children of those who were killed in that accident were no more deserving of sympathy and aid than those of the men who lost their lives nearer our own doors, and the unfortunate man who was disabled while bravely endeavouring, at the peril of his own life, to rescue his four entombed comrades.

Possibly tbe opinion which was ioi a while entertained that a portion of the surplus of the Kaitangata fund might be made available for the relief of the sufferers by the Huntly accident checked % the outflow of public liberality, but this hope now exists no longer. The reply elicited by His Worship the Mayor from the Kaitangata trustees shows that there are legal difficulties in the way of appropriating' any part of the fund to purposes other than that fo? which the money was [[raised, without a special enact?, ment. Whatever is to be done for the t wives and children who have been deprived of their bread-winners by the Huntly accident, must be the result of another display of philanthropy. And we believe that those who recall the circumstances of the tragedy which cast a gloom over the Christmas festival in Auckland, will agree that the cases of the bereaved have large claims upon public sympathy.

The necessity for this appeal, while a sum of upwards of the result of a colonial subscription for the relief of the victims of a mining accident, remains unexpended and with few clajms upon it, calls for public attention and the intervention of the Legislature. The total subscription on behalf of the Kaitangata sufferers was contributed from all parts of the colony. MrT. Peacock was Mayor of Auckland at the time, and upon his suggestion, in recognition of the colonial character of the fund, the Mayor of each of the large cilies was appointed a member of the Committee entrusted with the administration of the money. The final management of the fund, however, ultimately fell into the hands of the trustees, who invested it so well and have since administered it with such exemplary care and judgment that after the payment of ;£i 4,631 6d in direct alimony to the sofferers by the disaster, and 8s in expenses, or in all within £i&4 ias 6d of the total amount originally subscribed, there remained from the investment of the capital, at the end of 1889, the sum, of £\ 1,045 ios. The question of the future disposal of this money came up Jsefore the Mining Conference held in connection with the Dunedin Exhibition in February and

March last year, when the following resolutions were adopted upon the motion of Mr C. S. .Reeves: —"(i) That, in the opinion of this Conference, it is desirable that a miners' accident fund for the colony should be established. (2) That the trustees of the Kaitangata fund be recommended to take steps to approach Parliament next session, with a view to the extension of the application of the fund in the direction indicated by the first resolution." The Dunedin " Star," referring to this subject, says:—

The exact position of the matter was very explicitly stated by Mr John L. Gillies, who has been from, tho first; a very active agent in the distribution of the fund. Mr Gillios told the Conference thab, soon after tho fund was raised and placed in tho hands of trustees, the subject of extending the expenditure to accidents other than that which had taken place at Kaitungata was fully discussed by the subscribers, and, after repeated meeting?, it was decided that the money should not, be available for any other purpose than that for which ib was ra:sed. it was, however, he said, evident from the remarks of diflerent &peakers who opposed the extension thab they were nob adverse to the fund being devoted to other accidents "after sufficient provision was made for the first boneliciaires." One subscriber, for instance, Mr Gillios mentioned, maintained with*regard to the administration of tho Committee for tho time being that those who camo after them would be juab as competent to decide in which way the surplus of the fund should be allocated. Another gentleman observed that ib woufri be years and years bofore a single sixpence of the fund could bo divorted, and " no one would have the hardihood to come forward and propose its diversion so long as there was a single widow or orphan living who required to bo provided for. . . . Ib must be left to the future to determine what should be done with the funds when tho whole of tho Kaitangata sufierers had been fairly and thoroughly satisiied."_ It was manifest throughout tho discussions thab even those who wished an extension of the fund held that until the present claimants were fully satislied and fully provided for tho capital should not be encroached on in any shape or form. Mr Gillies proceeded to say that he quite agreed with making proper provision, so that the fund might bq utilised when its present purpose had departed. The trustees would, ho had reason to believe, of their own motion come forward so soon as the time had arrived when they could do so with safety, with little probability of opposition being oficred to any scheme they might propose. The subject, he added, had indoed been under consideration, and also of tho Executive Committee, of which he was a member ; and it was their intention, "in the courso of next year cr the following year," to apply for the necessary authority of Parliament. Id would, however, be two years bofo: c all the children would arrive at an ago when, according to the regulation that had been laid down, they would drop ofr tho fund. By that time a number of widows who had been married and who we.o receiving assistance for their children would also drop out; so

ho calculated that in about two years' time —i.e., at the end of 1891—there would nob be more than half a dozen or eight widows on the fund. Mr Gillies concluuod by suggosting that, perhaps the best plan to pursue would be for some Ot;igo uiomber to move in the Houso for the appointment ot an honorary commission in Dunedin to go into tho whole question of the fund with the trustees and the Executive, so that there might bo brought before Parliament some well-devised schema whevoby the fund might be administered in future. He quite realised that "in tlie course of a couple of years there would be perfect safety in enlarging the sphere of the fund ; and in doing so they would bo acting quite in accordance with the views o£ tho eubscribers."

There can be no doubt from the foregoing statement that the time has arrived when this fund should be made available for the relief of sufferers from mining accidents in all parts of the colony. It might become the nucleus of a permanent provision against calamities of this nature, to which mineowners and others who sympathise with the men who gain a living underground could contribute from time to time ; or a wider basis still might perhaps be given to it by creating a Miners' Accident Relief Fund to which miners could contribute upon some fixed basis, with benefit rights in case of being disabled by accident. At sny rate, whatever may after due consideration be deemed the wisest mode of disposing of the fund, it is at least certain that something should b"e done at once to make it available for accidents like that which occurred at Huntly lately, and if the trustees do not move in the matter this ysar, some member of the House or the new Minister of Mines ought to take steps in the desired direction.