DUTY TO UNEMPLOYED

Dominion, Volume 26, Issue 182, 29 April 1933, Page 12

DUTY TO UNEMPLOYED

Appeal to Think in Terms of Human Beings ADDRESS TO ELECTORS Dominion Special Service. Palmerston North. April 28. “If the number of unemployed increases and the Unemployment Board continues to adopt the policy of the past in asking local bodies to find employment for No. 5 men, then it follows that our expenditure must be increased correspondingly.” said the mayor, Mr. A. E. Mansford, when addressing electors in the Opera House this evening. .Mr. Mansford has been elected unopposed. “It is becoming increasingly difficult every week for the council to find work for No. 5 men,” he said. ' Any -work of a serious nature that we find means expenditure for materials. I have maintained right from the commencement, that the problem of unemployment has not been correctly tackled in this country, and perhaps in other countries, too. “We have got to think in terms of human beings and not in terms of money. Just as there are men who neglected their duty to the returned soldier who gave his all, so there are many who do not realise their duty to the large army of unemployed. It is around the standard of duty—duty to our fellow-men—rather than around the standard of self-interest that thinking men must rally to win the rights of man. “It is in this spirit and no other that we have power to solve our social problems and carry civilisation forward. I have endeavoured to the best of my ability to do my duty as mayor to my fellow-men in the past. Also let me say that this is also the spirit which actuated the past council tn carrying out its duty to all sections of the community.” The mayor said the city council had spent £7729 on wages and materials for the provision of relief work. In addition £1452 had been expended on relief work for returned soldiers, but this amount had been refunded by the Returned Soldiers’- Association. A further £O9OO had been raised by loan to provide additional work for the council’s permanent staff. During the year £25,579 had passed through the council from the Unemployment Board as relief work rates.