HOUSING OF FARM WORKERS

Press, Volume LXXIV, Issue 22336, 25 February 1938, Page 10

HOUSING OF FARM WORKERS

TO THE EDITOR OF THE PRESS. Sir, —Some time last week you published a leading article on the subject of housing accommodation for the married men working in the country. In my opinion there is no social matter of such importance to-day as the making of such provision. The basis of New Zealand s strength is its country industries. They are capable of great development, but it should be a provision that they should provide home-making facilities for the men engaged in the work. Yet owing to the financial difficulties, a farmer has to find the whole of the cash if he builds houses for his men, and few can face the outlay. Homes for the men on the farms are none too plentiful. Their provision would convert a dead-end occupation, in which men have to drift to town if they would marry, to one with the outlook for a home in the country, with the prospect of a steadily-growing country population, in itself providing a market for our city manufacturers. I am satisfied that this comparatively simple development would have effects more far-reaching than almost any measure that could be taken in New Zealand to-day; and it has the virtue of being comparatively simple and inexpensive.—Yours, etc., February 23, 1938.