IN THE PILLORY

Press, Volume LXXIV, Issue 22337, 26 February 1938, Page 16

IN THE PILLORY

Parliament Across the Backyard |By COMMENTATOR]

Hundreds of radio sets in homes in Christchurch are like the brook. They go on for ever—or as long as there is broadcast matter to be listened to. And that is through all the waking and many of the sleeping hours. It must gladden the hearts of members of the electricity committee of the City Council to think of the revenue that comes their way from loudspeakers consistently at work for 18 hours of the 24; but the continual sound can gladden very few else. Of course it is all a matter of taste, and as long as the sound is confined within the four walls of a home no one else has any right, or wish, to object. But unfortunately for hundreds of next-door neighbours and a big share of the general public, modern loudspeakers find distance no object. They bring the radio programmes to those who want to hear them, and then go on to make their best attempt at literally telling the world. People who work at night and have perforce to sleep later in the day than most normal workers seldom relish being awakened early in the morning by the strains of martial music, or good-cheer songs. The same applies to those who cannot go to sleep for the dance programme brought them, and half the street, by discourtesy of the house next door. And next week Parliament begins again, and through suburban streets and over fences and backyards will resound in a dozen suburbs the oratorical brilliance of the committee stages of a finance debate. Some of these unwilling listeners in fact seem destined to become the strongest upholders of the principle of applying the closure. The worst of tooloud radio sets is that so little can be done about them. The obvious step—making a formal complaint—involves a procedure the average peace-loving citizen does not feel inclined to follow.