TO BE REVISED

Evening Post, Volume CXI, Issue 70, 24 March 1931, Page 10

TO BE REVISED

UNEMPLOYMENT RELIEF

BOARD'S NUMBER 5 SCHEME

(By Telegraph.—Press Association.) CHHISTCHUKCH, 23rd March. "With 31,000 registered unemployed in the Dominion the resources of the Unemployment Board are insufficient to enable1 it.to continue the No. s.relief scheme in its present'form, and the plan is to bo revised," said Mr. W. E. Leadley at a meeting of the Citizens' Unemployment Committee to-day. A new policy would be announced shortly. The subject arose when a reply of the Unemployment Commissioner, Mr. Malcolm Fraser, to the committee' 3 suggestion tlmt tic cost of insuring . men under this scheme should be borne by the Unemployment1 Board .or the, Government was tabled. Mr. J. W. Beanland said there was a general feeling among local bodies that the State was getting a good deal of work clone for nothing and that it ;was reasonable that the board should pay tho insurance charges. "I can assure you there is no hope whatever of the Unemployment Board1 undertaking any further responsibility of this kind,'' said Mr. Leadley..'' Anyone who saw last week's figures—3l,ooo registrations for the Dominion —would realise that something has to happen in the near future. "If we go on at the present rate we will spend our income in under six months. Either the board will havo to get more, money, which does not seem likely, or we will have to revise the scheme. The board realises the position, and an announcement will probably be made in a few days." Mr. Beanland moved' that a letter be sent to the Unemployment Board asking if it could give- an assurancb that No. 5. scheme would be continued for some twelve months so that local bodies could make provision in their estimates for supervision, transport, and insurance to enable the work to be carried on during £he year. . The motion was carried.