ANDOM SHOTS

Auckland Star, Volume LVI, Issue 102, 2 May 1925, Page 22

ANDOM SHOTS

Zamil

cash, Some write s neighbour's name to lash. ,Kni retse a din; For mc, an alia I never faia, I write for fun.

Skirts are to be shorter, but it is not Etated that they are to be any cheaper.

Considering the popularity of the cross-word puzzle, the number of informal votes in Wednesday's voting was disappointingly large.

It is proposed, according to a message published this week, to make bricks in England out of ashes. Surely this betokens a rash confidence in the result o£ next Tears tests.

Mr. Churchill's greatest em as Chancellor of the Exchequer Eeems to be that he has introduced universal pensions himself instead of leaving them for the Labour party.

The Scots are giving up oatmeal and eating ham and eggs. It is some conEOlation to the English to know that at least one English gift to the world i£ appreciated in Scotland.

They are going to use cups and saucers instead of basins in Navy mesb'.'S. and a bluejacket's comment i= that ihi« is a sign of effeminacy. Good old boys of the bulldog breed!

So many Scotsmen are on their way to New Zealand that it is understood the playing of the bagpipes has been prohibited, lest vessels in the neighbourhood Eijould take the music as a =ignal of distress.

Among the defeated candidates on Wednesday wa-s at least one who may merit a prize for philosophic resignation and candour. '"One consolation," he announced, "is that the result of the election may be reflected in the more efficient administration of the borough.' .

"A Maori who had been working for the county told mc if he worked for mc he might "live for 40 years; if he worked for the County Council or Rivers Board, he could live for 100 years."—lf he worked for the Government, he might five to be 150.

Five English women have gone to Russia "to study the position of working women" there. It might have cost less to put these English women in working "positions," which are much the same all the world over, when washing and cooking have to be done.

At the Xapier Hospital inquiry it was etated that one of the patient witnesses who gave unfavourable evidence was immediately afterwards informed that he must be operated upon next day. Evidently they meant to get the truth out of him somehow!

A Christchurch builder, charged ■with making a. false declaration for purposes of income tax, explained thac he did not think profits derived from speculation were earned profits. The Magistrate said there must have been "a certain amount of muddling." Most speculators will understand both these statements,

Single men coming to New Zealand from England, as assisted immigrants, are now to pay £13 15/. Married men, £11. Shop worn goods are necessarily cheapened. Girls between 17 and 19 are to come "free" if with parents, but £5 10/ is charged to those coming without parents. The latter are probably the freer. The point of view. Resident of Parnell, Grey Lynn, or Ponsonby, to his wife, ac he left for business"on Wednesday morning: "Don't forget to vote, Mary. Remember to vote against both loan proposals, the Remuera Library as well as the Square. And, as you pass the library you might get mc a new novel." A few suggestions for the utilisation of the "Civic Square ,, ground may be offered: (1) That it be planted in pine trees and the timber used to pay off the city debt. (2) That it be used for a huge cinema theatre block. There would be a popular house and a house for educative film*, and the profit on tiie former would make up for the deficit 011 the latter. (3) That a branch of the Zoo be established there. (4) That it be turned into a bowling green or a miniature golf course —bowlers and golfers to EUbmit tenders. (5) That it be wholly given up to shops and office? and bear a great electric sign on top — "Proputty, proputty, proputty, that's what a 'ears 'em saay."

It is a gloomy picture that Auckland's Mr. Albert Spencer draws of industrial conditions in Britain. The shutters are going up in English factories. The foreigner is ousting the English manufacture, and the prospects for the latter seem hopeless. The British worker, under the dole system, appears to have lost the art of working. It is all very sad, and no doubt there is some justification for anxiety. I comfort myself, however, with Mr. Dooley's one thought when he was told that the world was going to the dogs, that the foundations of everything worth while were being sapped—that it wasn't so. After all, when, as Mr. Churchill announced this week, England is raising £820.000,000 in revenue this year, and has reduced her debt interest by £70.000.000 in five years, it looks as if somebody was working.

Something must really be done to improve our knowledge of candidates for the City Council. This time there were forty-four candidates, and I would like to hear of one voter who knew something about all of them. Accident gave a turn to many votes. A friend of mine was accosted on the step of the polling booth by a candidate of whom he knew nothing. It turned out that they had worked in the same office years before. The result was the voter voted for the candidate, and even then he could not make up his list to the required twenty-one. It used to be said that it wa? more difficult to get out of the Australian eleven than to get into it. and the same may apply to the City Council. If for no better reason siting councillors will be re-elected because they have been councillors, and therefore mean a little more than nothing to the voter. There ought to be something in tlie nature of a preliminary canter. Speeches would not be much good, for electors don't go to such meetings. What is needed is a daily parade of candidates in Queen Street, varied by an appearance in the straight at Ellerslie.