AUSTRALIAN FUND

Evening Post, Volume CXI, Issue 40, 17 February 1931, Page 11

AUSTRALIAN FUND

BELATED ORGANISATION

(From "The Post's" Represontativ*.) SYDNEY, 12th February.

The close relations existing between Australia ana New Zealand were emphasised by the events that followed the terrible earthquake at Napier and Hawkes Bay. It is estimated that there are at least 50,000 New Zealanders in Australia, 30,000 of them being in Sydney alone. The news created tremendous interest and real sorrow, and the casualty list was studied by thousands with the deepest anxiety. Every day special bulletins were posted on the windows of the New Zealand Offices in Melbourne and Sydney, and the New Zealand representatives were called upon to answer thousands of inquiries from anxious relatives. The newspapers spared no expense in securing the latest details, and in this direction made full use of the wireless telephone One paper in Sydney booked calls to every town between Napier and Wellington, and its best story came from a survivor who arrived at Masterton the day after the earthquake with his motor-car laden, with wounded. Other stories came from Dannevirke, Waipukurau, Woodville, and Palmerston North, and there were in addition wireless telephone lnessageß from Auckland and Wellington. Thus were the Sydney papers quick to realise tho news value of the dreadful catastrophe. Australia felt the deepest sympathy foilier sister Dominion.

If the relief funds that aro being raised in Sydney do not reach a subsantial total, the people must not be blamed. There would have been a ready response if a request to contribute had been made promptly. The reason for this delay is difficult to understand, and in some quarters it is reported that cold water was thrown on early suggestions that a fund should be opened for the reliof of suffering. Finally, four days after the disaster the Lord Mayor was approached by members of the New Zealand Association in Sydney, and ho agreed to call a public meeting. The organisation of the fund evon then was lax, and the result will be that Sydney will not contribute more than £2000, whereas if the appeal had gone forward earlier it might have realised more than £10,000. Many people who were anxious to contribute could find no one willing to receive the money. However, various entertainments have been arranged, but it will bo some time before the financial resiilts of these aro known.

Tho spontaneous desire to give was killed by someone. It would be interesting to know who that wmeoite wss..