IS THERE WASTE ?

Evening Post, Volume XCIII, Issue 45, 21 February 1917, Page 8

IS THERE WASTE ?

..TO THE EDITOR. Sir,—As a visitor to your city; I was interested in the way some workmen wero taking up the street in the neighbourhood I of Courtenay-place for the purpose, of. laying down a. concrete foundation to ! carry the woodeu blocks. I thin,k if the City Council had an efficiency board similar to the one which has just been set up by the Government, and this board had inspected. the process of mixing the concrete, they would have been struck by the inefficiency of the work done. There were four men mixing the cement with the gravel,- another shovelling it mixed to the.'man who was spreading it, and the process was very slow. In the country, where naturally we would turn to- Wellington to see efficient methods, we have concrete-mixers, and an engine attached .to drive them. The whole process goes on with minimum of labour and a maximum of .speed consistent with. .thorough work. Yet here was an antediluvian method going on in the Empire City! It was somewhat distressing to see the waste of labour when we hear on. all hands the great scarcity of man-power. There may, of course, be some satisfactory explanation.—l am; etc., VISITOR, • ; 20th February.