POSITION AT LOWER HUTT

Evening Post, Volume CV, Issue 125, 29 May 1928, Page 10

POSITION AT LOWER HUTT

Councillor Meldrum asked the Mayor of Lower Hutt (Mr. W. T. Strand) last evening what was being done in the borough to meet eases oi; unemployment and whether anything was being done in relation to the scheme recently proposed by the Ma3ror of Wellington. In reply tho Mayor said that about twelve of tho most urgent cases had been found work, but lie had found that numbers of men who had been put off from the meat works, and who had been earning in some cases from £8 to £10 per week, were applying for work immediately they wore put off from the works, and he thought it wrong for these men to come in before those who had been on labourers' wages during the summer. Then, too, men 'from outside districts wore applying. The work in the borough should be kept for borough residents. Men now applying who had been employed'recently were required to show a certificate from their late employers showing what wages they had been earning. Councillor Campbell said a register should be kept and as far as possible every man should be given employment. It did not always follow that because a man had been receiving high wages that he was less deserving thjin the man who had been receiving small wages. Councillor M'JBain spoke on similar lines.- Councillor Meldrum spoke of the urgency of meeting the problem. Tho Mayor promised that he and the officers would go carefully into the question of finding as much work of a reproductive nature as possible. Councillor Campbell gave an interesting resume of the discussion which had taken place in the .recent industrial conference, and stated that a committee had- been set up to gather rliita / and report on remedies.