THE POCKET-MONEY GIRL

Dominion, Volume 11, Issue 85, 3 January 1918, Page 3

THE POCKET-MONEY GIRL

PRODUCT OF THE WAR

AND A PROBLEM FOR, AFTER

What is to happen when the war ends to the girl who has done good service during the war and had live time of her life because of her plentiful pocket-money? The great number of girls who are in this position in England raises an important economic ana social and moral problem there, aud is not without interest here in New Zealand. Pooliet-Monoy Earners. "A very large number—without fear of contradiction, olio might say thousands—of the clerical workers to-day employed on Government jobs are 'pocket-monoy" wage-earners," says s, writer in "The Times." '"Ihey have come, perhaps, from patriotic motives into Government work, and they have the money which they earn for their own spending. Their manner of spending is open for anyone to see —highheeled boots, transparent stockings, low-throated blouses, and the inevitable fur coat or fur-collared coat, with its inovi tabic pockets. What ■& icy tto with their earnings should bo no one's business but their own. Unfortunately, it is not. The habit of frequent new clothes becomes a passion, and it is not unlikely that in .the keen competition for the limited amount of clerical work available after the war these girls living at home will bo prepared to accept lower wages than the legitimate worker in order to retain their pocket-money. "There are, of course, two classes of women in Government Departments doiug clerical work who do not need the money. There is the woman who can afford to live in an hotel and has come up from the country to work, who has shown a fine esprit de corps before now in standing bv the girl whose living it is, hy demanding bonusos and so forth wlien they were given to men clorical workers. And there is the young woman living in the suburbs in her father's house, paying nothing for her keep, who'is having the 'time of her life,' and has no intenI tion of going into retirement when tho war is over."

A Useful Conference. "The Women's Industrial Council, with Miss Clementina, Black as president. which has done some very strong constructive work in the past, is concerning itself with this problem. "A joint committee has been formed and a conference will be held ill October, of which Henry Bentinck will be chairman. The speakors will inolude Miss Susan Lawrence and Miss Lena Ashwelf. Representatives ct trado unions concerned with clerical work—the National Union of Clerks, the War Emergency Clerical Association, the Association for Women Secretaries and Clerks, and "the Railway Clerks' Association —the Women Workers' Federation, the' National Federation of Girls' Clubs, tho suffrage societies, the Headmistresses' Association, the Y.AV.C.A., and the Girls' Friendly Society have been invited to attend, and "also tho women heads of Government Departments and their welfare supervisors. "The pvoblem is one which concerns Government Departments very closely; thousands of girls will be turned out of the various boards and Ministries at the end of the war, and they -will flood a. market already overstocked I ivith olerical labour from civilian em- | ployers who may have been engaged on munitions of war.

"At least one Government Department lias realised tho chaos that is likely to follow wholesale dismissals. The Army Pay Department, which employs something like ] 5,000 girls <11 work much of which is not definitely clerical, svpproaohed the Women's Industrial Council for advice, not knowing that a conference had been dceided upon. A foretasto of what will happen when the men como back to civilian life has already beep seen in one of the overseas offices, where, some months ago, the female staif weTe ;,vith a few exceptions replaced by. partiallydisabled men. '

"It is the young woman who lives at home and pays nothing for her lu-ep who is tlio danger, and it is 011 her account that the conference is to te held. Religious societios have been asked to attend, because the problem concerns them when the. bona-fide worker has her wages reduced below the 'bread-line] and is tempted to supplement them in dubious ways. , What Will They Do? "The conference lias a bis task \efore it; further training \\i clerical work to raise the level of efficiency would bo useless, for there would rot be a sufficient number of posts to fill. Schemes of training for women at present engaged in clerical work woald require some new objective and be concerned with industrial enterprises which would be able to absorb them immediately, or soon after, the declaration of peace. It may he assumed that the Treasury will make some provision or grant equivalent at least to three months' wages, so that these girls who are actually dependent 011 their earnings for a living will not be stranded. The 'pocket-money' , girl wageearner will have to be carefully dealt with. She has in some cases efficiently, in others inefficiently, filled a gap and helped in the working o? the various Government Departments. Now she must be induced to leave clerical work to those whose profession it is. or if she decides to stay on as a. worker she must learn'not to be a 'blackleg.' But the most important work the conference could do would be to suggest some definite constructive scheme by which the great mass of clerical workers could be diverted, md willingly at that, to other werk.

"FAILURES "

At prize presentations (says an Austerest very much centred in the children wlio are meant by the chairmen tralian writer) I always find my inwhen lie arrives at the latter part of his speech, commencing, "And now a word to those who hare not been successful in securing a prize. I'dont want them to he downhearted." I always imagine how some of them must bo "squirming" under the well-intend-ed advice. Many of them also aro left ont of the prize list through no fault of their own. Examinations a'.e "nightmarish" ordeals, and I one® heard a professor remark that he wouldn't Rive twoponce for any cf them in the matter of testing a pel': son's capabilities. On the face of it this looked rather a sweeping assertion, but viewed rationally it ceascs to be peculiar. Apropos, I know a certain girl who'is blessed with brilliant attainments of 110 mean order. Some of the school work she performs is really remarkable for a lass of her age. And yet as an examinee she is a rank failure. Directly she enters a room, and knows she is to undergo a rigid test, she instantly gets possessed with a distressing species of stage fright, which render her incapable of acquitting herself well. She is only perhaps one of many similar eases, i:nd when I hear the chairman at a- pmo presentation giving the stereotyped concluding sentences "expressly to the luckless failures," I always find my thoughts' very much in sympathy with tliosn particular individuals, and 1 wonder how many of them are excluded from tho nrizo list simply because at the crucial moment thoir brain absolutely rofuses voluntarily to perform the work whio'a an examination demand's of it.