WANTED: A GENERAL

Evening Post, Volume LXXV, Issue 09, 11 January 1908, Page 5

WANTED: A GENERAL

THE ELUSIVE DOMESTIC. There is still an unßatisfisd i clamouring in Wellington — and in the country generally for that matter— for • female servants. "They won'fc go as generals mor now — that's the cause of the scarcity," observed a registry 'office keeper to a representative of The Post this morning. "They want to specialise," she added. "They want to hs either cooks, or housemaids, or nursemaids ; but they will not be generals." "Are the wages not high enough ?" the registry office keeper was asked. "Well, (.hey are high, but apparently j not high enough," was the reply. You j cannot expect girls to go to Wanganui for 17s 6d a week when they can get £1 in town. They prefer town in any case to the country. When a ship comes in from London. 1 receive shoals of letters for girls of all kinds — housemaids, cooks, generals, and nursemaids. It seems as if Wellington, and perhaps all New Zealand also, will have to look to the Old Country for future supplies. Ex-cuse-mo a moment." The telephone rang. Returning, the ■ domestic "registrar" said : "What do you think of that— a girl engaged to go to a lady has not turned up ? She left here with the ex pressed intention of going to the place, too. Only they are always doing that. It is annoying to people. I advise all my clients to prosecute girls who engage and do not turn up. They can do it, you know. It ha 3 been done, and that successfully, in Christchurch. But people do not want to bo bothered in attending the courts. It is annoying, and takes up a lot of time, but I must nay the employers are suffering a great injustice at the hands of girls who break their word and sometimes keep a good girl out of the place they havo refused. * - That domestic, hybrid, the lady help, was referred to. The "registrar," while admitting that the. privilege of being arklrcssoil as '"Miss" and tho exemption of v.oiuvift a cap tempted' some girls to take up housework as lady helps, pointed out that tho "help" would not scrub, wash clothes, or cook. She would dust furniture and do some other things, but nothing arduous. 1 Enquiries made at other registry offices, and also at the Labour Department, failed to elicit any ray of nope for (he housewife in search of domestic auxiliaries, especially of the general utility description. All eyes seem to be directed to steamers from Home. These arrive and land their hundreds, and still the" demand for domestic help remains unsatisfied.