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WOMEN IN THE CIVIL SERVICE.

THEIR PRESENT ANXIETY. A correspondent writes to "Dominica" as follows: — "Dominica's" words in Monday's issue of TriE Dominion concerning women and tho Government retrenchment scliemo are so good that I wish she'd go a little- further and write of the anxious band of womenworkers in our Civil Service. Could she look into tho hearts of most of those' trim, neat figures as they wend their way to " tho biggest wooden building in tho world," or to adjacent premises, sho might bo surprised at tho misery that tho suspcjiso is working there. It is well-known that tho majority of men think all unmarried women-workers occupy good comfortable homes, and spend all their salary upon their 'backs. Will "Dominica" try to undeceive- not only men generally, but in particular the men who form the Cabinet of Now Zealand? Let her tell of the women who are working to keep a homo for the widowed mother or delicate sister who caniiot face the rough world, who have, perhaps, just attained their object when tho fiat goes forth that "retrenchment and amalgamation" aro to send them all forth to look for fresh work and their daily bread; of those, again, who by clubbing their salaries together havo been able to leave the comfortless boardinghouse and to make a home together—a real home, where they can be as domestic as all true women love to be, where they caii do their sewing and dressmaking, and contrive out of a few shillings what some members of tho masculine gender will consider has cost pounds, because most men judge by tho effect. I could tell "Dominica" talcs of selfsacrifice among these girls and women, of poorer relatives helped to an extent that richer folk would shrink from, of the hungry fed and the naked clothed by some of these girls from their slender salaries. I could tako her into quiet rooms where a week ago there was comparative happiness, and where fear has now worked such havoc that one sees poverty and misery lurking in each corner, and orders for coal and necessaries of life have been countermanded because there may be no homo left in a month or two in which to light a fire. What is tho Premier going to do with tho women of the Service? Is ho going to cast thoso who are helpless to help themselves in the present state of trade and commerce and tho money market unemployed on tho streets of Wellington, or will he assure them that this retrenchment will not touch them, and so comfort miserable restless hearts? Even the most callous of nowspapers which have preached retrenchment could not dissent if tho Premier intimated that, tho woman who is entirely dopendent upon herself, or who has others dependent, or partly so, upon her, shall not suffer. "Dominica" may also take it that women "wasters" in the Service aro tho exception.

And there is a darker side still to the picture of retrenchment. Tako tho woman who has been dependent on her own- exertions' since sho was a girl; the Classification Act passed lately promised her a small pension when-sho is too old to work. If she must go, and with her all hope for tho future, what is to bo the end? "She cannot dig, and to beg she is ashamed."

Dominica" thinks that thero is a great deal in what her correspondent from tho Civil Servico says about tho claim of the women clerks to retain their positions, lien have a goneral idea that women earn only to spend ■ their money on dress, and it is well that "they should be occasionally reminded .how ofteiuwomon workers liavo others dependent on them. At times of financial stress there is frequently a cry that women aro taking tho positions that should be hold by married men, the. presumption always beinj that tho women have no one to support, and that they are doing what is a mans natural work. Clerking is not work for men. They should be on tho land, engaged in manual work, or in mental work that is too arduous for women. Tho fact is, that they have for so lode usurped the easier walks of life that they have como to regard them as their right, and do not realise that they should now he leaving those ways open for the women who aro obliged to earn a livelihood. Of course,' it is true that many a. girl, who does not require to do so, earns her own living, or at least her own pocketmoney, rather than remain in aimless idleness, and were she to loso her billet in a time like this, sho could not complain. But for the others, the girls who must (Sim their own living, and who aro giving good servico for the wages they receive, thero'should certainly be every i consideration, and it will bo a source of satisfaction to many outside tho ranks of the Civil Servico if they aro retained in their present positions.

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Permanent link to this item

https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/DOM19090408.2.4.5

Bibliographic details

Dominion, Volume 2, Issue 477, 8 April 1909, Page 3

Word Count
842

WOMEN IN THE CIVIL SERVICE. Dominion, Volume 2, Issue 477, 8 April 1909, Page 3

WOMEN IN THE CIVIL SERVICE. Dominion, Volume 2, Issue 477, 8 April 1909, Page 3