HOUSEWORK AS A PROFESSION.

Auckland Star, Volume LXIX, Issue 254, 27 October 1938, Page 16

HOUSEWORK AS A PROFESSION.

Meeting the Shortage Of Domestic Help.

Housewives throughout New Zealand are increasingly concerned at the difficulty of obtaining domestic help. Modern frills, tliey complain, cannot be induced to undertake this work. Employers offer good wages and conditions in vain. I'o remedy this state of affairs

a group of Wanganui social workers has been formed with the idea of launching a homecraft association to piovide what is at present lacking- from domestic work—scope for ambition and advancement —by making housework into a real profession for women. The honorary secretary, Mrs. J. G. Denniston. Wanganui, told "The Dominion"' that the object was to found ;i train-rig college at which girls leaving secondary .schools could qualify as "homecraft scholars" after a short period of training. They would then make a career of housework, going into employment fur two or three vears, when tliey would tic eligible to qualify us "homecraft students." They would then be entitled to ask for higher wages, in view of their greater efliciency and respond ibilitv. Eater they would again return for advanced study in dietetics, budgeting and home management, which would qualify them for such posts as school and institution matrons or housekeepers, managers or hostesses at hotels and tourist hostels, caterers for 'clubs and restaurants and similar professional engagements. They would then be qualified "homecraft graduates." The college would run an employment bureau to tind positions for its students. It must insist upon good conditions of work, adequate leisure time to participate in outdoor sport or exercise, and nours, holidirys and wages in keeping with other professions open to working girls. Methods of Training. The college would consist of two or three typical New Zealand homes, equipped variously with gas, coal range and electricity. One house would probably be run as a holiday home for children whose mothers have to go into hospital, or are anxious to he relieved of them temporarily. This would permit the more advanced students to learn to care for children, an important part of their future work. They would be taught the elementary psychology of childhood. On the cultural side, they would be assisted to bridge the gap •between the group interests of school life and the individual responsibilities and intorcsts of adult life.

The college would as far as possible be self-supporting. Membership of the association would be on the basis of a small annual subscription.

A second aspect of the shortage of domestic help was the position of the mothers of young families in real need of assistance in the home, but unable to pay an adequate wage for it. A Mothers' Help Society was Wing formed in Wanganui, with the idea of employ-

ing and paying experienced women to work in those homes where tliey were most needed, whether or not the mother could afford to pay them. "Many people say despairingly, 'Girls are so difficult to fret, and when you do pet them tliey know nothing,'" said Mrs. Dcimiston. "Here is something constructive to do about it. The committee is very anxious to know whether there would lie any support for the scheme, in particular from the employers who would engage these scientifically tra.incd girls in the early stages of their career."