PEOPLE STARVING

Evening Post, Volume CXIII, Issue 29, 4 February 1927, Page 8

PEOPLE STARVING

MINE CLOSED DOWN

PLIGHT AT KAITANGATA

(By Telegraph.) (Special to "The Eveninn Post.")

DUNEDIN, This Day. Far more serious than it is generally supposed to be is the plight that the people of Kaitangata have been plunged into The position is grave indeed, and acute distress is being felt. The mine", have not been paid for nine weeks, and fc'lOO is said to be owing them by the T^77- iThc m. en are hanging jfboufc day after day waiting for some definite ZZVJ^ ot the *ai*r™*a»t down and nOW cast them

tnritl b f usln£ ss.P e °P1° in town are suftaring, for Kaitangata depends on the mine and the money that comes from i °f *"• the men -and women and children too are starving. Hunger is to be seen in their faces. If the money does not come soon the shot), keepers, who have loyally stood by the townspeople, will have to close down What can be done? The men are eager for work and they are good. worke^ but there 1S nothing for them to do In the meantime they are faced by the stark spectre of starvation, and those who have gathered a home round them are faced with the cruel truth that if the mine closes, down Kaitangata town, with all they have worked for is

These were considerations placed before the Acting-Prime Minister (the Hon. Dowme Stewart) by a deputation that waited on him asking that assistance be given by the Government. The Minister was sympathetic. He told xnem that the money was available if Handy work of a public nature could be tound, and that even now the Public Works Department was seeing what could be done. He also asked whether the company would agree to the men working the mine on a co-operative basis till their wages we/c paid. So far as he knew, the company was an English one which had fallen into the hands of the debenture-holders, and, if the money were put in, they would claim it. So long as the. debentureholders existed it did not seem feasible to put forward any scheme for the benefit of the miners. The only course he could see was for the company to. offer the'mine to a syndicate or company at the market value. Another scheme was for the company to let the miners work.on a co-operative basis with fribute, and they would then be able to get their wages due. However, at present, any profits would be seized by the bank or the others holding a claim over the property. If the Government offered to carry on the mina and pay the miners, every industry in collapse in the Dominion would make the same request. He knew that no group of individuals in the Dominion would be induced to take over the mine under an arrangement of the do-benture-hoMers having first claim.