SOCIAL WORK

Dominion, Volume 10, Issue 2941, 29 November 1916, Page 3

SOCIAL WORK

• "— ~~~* ~ '■ ACTIVITY OF THE P.'S.S.A. . A very live wire in social work .in Dunedin is Mr. E. A. Axelsen, superintendent for the Presbyterian Social Service at Dunedin, and Probation Officer, in. that city. Speaking at the General Assembly last week. Mr. Axelsen said that the report would show that thoy had 340 children- under their care when the report was drafted. Now they' Lad about 350. Of that number no fewer' than 55 were ai the front, all of whom were under 21 years of age. (Applause.) It was to their credit, he thought, that of their boys who had offered their services 100 per cent, had been by the Defence Department, and they were now either on active service or in camp. (Applause.) He was asked frequently why, in his speeches, he only referred to the boys. That was because the girls, on coming into the homes, settled down quietly as a rule, and in due course went out to work and became decent members of the community. If one did play up occasionally and become famous, she was singled out for attention as "the product of the orphanage':" That'.was why lie usually talked about the boys. A prominent police officer had told him that for its size Dunedin was the cleanest city in the Southern Hemisphere, so that others would know what they lacked who lived in darker regions. The Minister of Education, the Hon. J. A. Hanan, .when in Auckland, .had had brought under his notice, the work that was being done 'there in connection with the Juvenile Courts, and had gone as far as to say that it was a pity the Auckland example was not copied in Wellington, Christchurch, and Dunedin. 'The Minister's statement was not correct—he was not seized of the full facts of the case. The work was commenced in this country in Dunedin ten years ago; three years later it was taken up in Christchurch, a year later in Wellington, and later still in Auckland. When the association commenced work it had asked that, the children they wero interesting themselvesin should bo nominally committed to industrial schools so that if the Social Service agent found that under his control they wero unfit for such liberty they could be sent to an industrial school. But tho work had proved a great success everywhere, arid it had been commenced by the P.S.S.A. in Dunddin. (Applause.) The movement had been referred to in papers laid before both Houses of Parliament, and in those reports was to be found the name of the P.S.S.A. 'They had laid it down that no boy or girl should be sent to an industrial school unless they disclosed criminal tendencies or proved intractable under homo influences. In tho_ latter case they usually took tlicm into their homes or tried to obtain places for them in tho country. They welcomed tho interest that was being taken in tho movement by the Government, and welcomed everything they could do to improve the 'system, but they were not going to be'interfered with unless they could be shown something better. (Applause.)