DESERTING HUSBANDS.

Press, Volume LXV, Issue 13376, 18 March 1909, Page 6

DESERTING HUSBANDS.

The " absent-minded beggars," who slip over to Australia and " leave a lot of " little things behind them," havo for many years been a source of worry to Charitable Aid Boards and expense to the ratepayers. Wife desertion is not, we fancy, quite so common as it was some years ago, but the number of husbands who evade their responsibilities by leaving their wives and families without means of support is still undesirably large. The Dunedin Benevolent Trustees, who have suffered from this cause in common with all other charitable organisations, intend to ask the Minister for Justice to arrange with the other Australasian Governments to facilitate tho execution of orders under

the -Destitute Persons Act in other colonies. The object is a desirable one, but we are afraid that it will not succeed. It is difficult to sco how any alteration of the law can get over the necessity of the New Zealand Government going to considerable expense to bring back a defaulting husband. The process costs something like £50, and unless the expenses are guaranteed, the Government will take no steps. As the deserted wife is rarely in a position to guarantee such a sum, the defaulting husband is allowed to retain the unlawful liberty he has sought. The action of the Government is quite intelligible. Cases have occurred where wives havo refused to prosecuto husbands who have been brought back, in which event the expenditure is so much money thrown away. And again there is no guarantee, if a husband were brought back, that he would stay here. A magistrate might order him to pay so much a week to his wife, but unless the man wero put in gaol because he could not find security for doing so, thero would be nothing to prevent him going off again next week. And if he were put into gaol, it would only mean that the country would have to keep him, as well as his wife andi family. The deserting husband is an offender who richly deserves punishment, but he is frequently a person whose departure leaves New Zealand none the poorer, and as it is impossible to make him shoulder his responsibilities if he is determined to evade them, little is to bo gained by dragging him back.