"MEN'S WORK."

Auckland Star, Volume LXXI, Issue 245, 15 October 1940, Page 6

"MEN'S WORK."

The Transport Board yesterday considered a suggestion that war conditions may necessitate the replacement of men by women on the trams, and that, in anticipation of such a need arising, women should be trained for the work. In a country officially committed to an "all-in" war effort this is a perfectly sound suggestion, worthy of consideration on its merits; but the Transport Board's treatment of it was as nervous as if its members had been required suddenly to dispose of a time bomb. It finally decided that the time was inopportune, as it ,does not anticipate difficulty in maintaining its staff, for which there is a long waiting list. But this argument does not dispose of the question. Many thousands of New Zealanders are in the armed services, and so lost to their civil occupations. More will be so lost as time goes on. The task before the Government, a task in which it is entitled to the co-operation of public bodies, is to dispose the remaining manpower in the directions in which its work will be most useful to the war effort. The fact that the Transport Board has a waiting list is not necessarily an indication that it will never need women on its tramway staff. Possibly many of those on the waiting list would be of greater use, in wartime, in some other employment, and it is possible also for cii-cumstances to arise in which the board will be required to transfer some of its present employees to work even more essential than the operation of the tram service. There will then be a call for women workers in increasing numbers. Why not prepare for that contingency? The Women's War Service Auxiliary evidently has a useful preliminary work to do, in getting the men used to the idea.