MR. R. SEMPLE TALKS ON UNEMPLOYMENT

Dominion, Volume 21, Issue 191, 15 May 1928, Page 10

MR. R. SEMPLE TALKS ON UNEMPLOYMENT

“TO HELL WITH DOLES!”

Dominion Special Service.

Christchurch, May 14. “To hell with doles! The unemployed don't want them. No sclf-respeetmg man wants a woman to stand at a street cornor with a box in her hand caugin o money in his name. What he wants m work. There is no need for cadgiu„ exhibitions ; there is no need to send women to the Social Welfare Committee begring for food.” . , r The above remarks were made by Ml. R Semple, bite national president of the New Zealand Labour Party, and secretary of the Wellington General Labourers’ Union. in addressing a the unemployed at the Trades Hall this m There was an attendance of about fifty, and Mr. C. E. Baldwin, president of the New Zealand Workers Union, was in the chair. . Mr. Semple said he supposed that t icic were thousands of men in New Zealand jobless and homeless to the ektent that they were dependent on the chanty of others for food and shelter, lhere must be something wrong with the system which produced unemployment in New Zealand. He blamed the Government for consciously assisting to create the present position. There had been 84,520 people brought to the Dominion in the past six years. Deducting those who had left the country, the excess of arrivals over departures was 65,030, and in the past five vears 15,000 people had been driven off the land.. Mr. Semple went on to criticise the booklets issued by the , ernment Publicity Department, which, lie said, gave an entirely wrong impression to people living in squalid conditions in the Old Country, of life in New Zealand. Some of the statements, lie declared, were absolute falsehoods. One of the most tragic aspects of the question, he said, was the fact that they had hundreds, if not thousands, of young men leaving schools and colleges looking for jobs and unable to find them. Instead of these young fellows becoming useful citizens many of them were thrown into the unemployed army. Lhe unemployed did not want charity, they wanted work. Mr. S. Fournier: At full wages. Air. Semple: Yes—at full wages. Air. Semple then made the remarks regarding doles. He said he felt that the unemployed themselves could do a lot towards banishing from New Zealand penury and want and misery.. an( * women were victims of* a hellish form of usury at present, he declared.