SYDNEY SCENE.

Auckland Star, Volume LXXII, Issue 76, 31 March 1941, Page 5

SYDNEY SCENE.

THEFT OF RINGS. | AIR DEATH SEQUEL. PARACHUTE SUPPLIES. / SYDNEY, March 29. A cool thief walked out of W. C. ■ Taylor and Company's, city jewellers, .'; cne , <I»y this week with a tray of 14 ' diamond rings valued at £.300. The son .of on e of tho owners of the business was Wone i n the ghop whgn a we]l . dre6sed ■an entered and presented one of the .fne cards on which was written, in the SL°V Ir - Ta >' lor > scn - the * erial rin« a tray of s!n ? 10 «tonc diamond i After looking at the rings the * said he wanted something more itxTlu' and Ta ylor, junior, who "beW« v the man " IUMt bo a genuine ,faf^ e \ ecause of the card w 'th his t> tol? f andwr 'ting on it, went to get NES of When he turned «o a gain t]le man had dj^pppaj.g,, ' t ßev«! ♦ ary POliee intelligence officers bcBlEi.9 r ; havc discovered the printing pub,w-' Ch ha 6 •**" ■sponsible for the ;. 'EJS tlon . 0f *»<* of the subversive - 'IV a T t . ur ? circulating throughout AustraW« f„, IS , ? tated that the Plant, which «f id !" P rem > s <« on the north side ! '• landLr ' inc,,Kl « , «l an up-to-date 1 * lar'l modern ofli(jC equipment and ' ■•Uted ♦w PP '? of newsprint. It is also ; '■ Wethn * a , arge mimbcr of pamphlets I **nfef ™?v dulent i,n l'nnt of one of the | «st Plication houses in Australia.

Wt. Pane's Tail Cut Off. ! Bffi-t?KfV\ t,M ' * upply (,t Wfcbjbt? eT^ n , ' ,f !" est at Capi 'lo " mSM f i r Glrd,pl "< 27 ' air observer. = >OS! and n-T n0 died of in i» "hen Wi fi?W llded "ear Casino on March J °hn Joseph O'Brien, of IPS;*?? thcV Wl ' r «' ">"'-' i" a .. .«»■ Of four plane*. His plane got

out of control when it 6 tail was cut off by a wing of another plane, and he and Girdler quickly decided to bale out, using his own parachute. He clinVbed out of the window holding on to Girdler and sat waiting for Girdler to follow. .Suddenly the slipstream swept him away and broke his hold on Girdler, when the plane was about 300 feet above the ground. He landed uninjured. In reply to the coroner, O'Brien said no more parachutes were available, when Girdler went to get one. The coroner found O'Brien guilty of negligence in allowing Girdler to embark without a parachute, but said it did not amount to criminal negligence. After the inquest it was admitted in Parliament byj the Air Minister, Mr. McKwen, that it should not have been possible for Girdler i to ha\c- gene on the flight without a! parachute. Mr. McEwen said there.] would be a searching inquiry into the' personal responsibility for this. He' explained that ordinary cross-country i flights were regarded as equivalent to civilian flying, and because there was not enough parachutes for all purposes, parachutes were not required on such occasions. Woolcott Forbes Case. The Woolcott Forbes conspiracy case, after an hour and a half's legal argument in the Central Criminal •Court this week, was adjourned for a fortnight. The accused are Ronald Bruce Walker, 42, M.L.A. and solicitor; Albert ]/evitus, .'J"), solicitor; Olive Oscar Aircy, 4.1, company secretary; and William Kingslev Wicks, 41, accountant, who appeared in khaki. They are accused of having conspired with John Woolcott Forbes, missing Sydney financier, David Robert Provan and Albert Edward Walker to cheat and defraud various people in connection with , tlie Scottish Loan and Finance Com- ; pany. Forbes, Provan and A. E. Walker, , who had been charged in a previous indictment, were not charged on this occasion. It was stated that Bench warrants had been issued for their i arrest but they had not been located. One of the defending counsel said that a copy of the Crown prosecutor's 70-page > address during the hearing in the lower , Court had not been delivered to him in i the time ordered by the Court. He said i lie understood that 70 of the original '•140 wit'ics-i's would not be.called. He j°>M!ntl'd a li>t of them, so that if neees- i lie could call them for the defence..!

Child Endowment Plans. The Federal Government is likely to strike serious trouble over it', detcrmina tion to provide most of tha finance required for its Child Endowment Plan by means of a payroll tax. It is argued that this will penalise employers and enable other wealthy people to escape. The bill to establish the scheme and enable payments to begin on July 1 reveals the following as the chief features of the plan:—-

Five shillings a week will foe paid! for all children under 16 after the first child, including "children of aborigines and half-castes living under conditions comparable with white Australians." Income tax deductions for children for whom endowment is paid will he abolished, but endowment will not be regarded as income for taxation purposes.

The withdrawal of tax deductions is certain to be contested by Labour as it will mean that in some cases a family will be worse off financially with endow" ment than without it. The scheme will cost £13.000,000 a year. Tribute to Britons. Glowing tributes to the courage of the British people under bombing were paid by 105 members of the A.1.F., invalided home, who arrived after an adventurous SO-day journey by a devious route from England, -where most of them had been for several months. These men when in London on leave mostly spent it in raid rescue work. They" have signet rings made from bits of Dornier 'bomber* and souvenir pieces of Messerschmitt fighters which they 'brought down while manning anti-aircraft defences in England. One soldier said: "Those folk are magnificent, particularly the women. And Britain's children are a real headache for Hitler. I watched hundreds of children rupning round London with wet bags while firebombs were falling. As soon as a firebomb dropped, the children would wrench off its fin and then run for another. They sell the fins as souvenirs for 6d." The Australians saw ithe bodies of Germans washed up on the icoast last September when Hitler is isupposed to have made an invasion jattempt. They said experts believed he [had employed 60,000 men, but the Navy and the R.A.F. met the barges in midChannel and Wasted them to pieces.