TO GET MORE WORK

Evening Post, Volume CXII, Issue 3, 3 July 1931, Page 9

TO GET MORE WORK

A FALSE DECLARATOIN

FINE OF £5 INFLICTED

Edgar George Neel, a native of England, aged 34, was fined £5 by Mr. E. Page, S.M., at. the Magistrate's Court to-day on a charge of obtaining money from the Unemployment Board by falsely representing that he was a married man with a wife and two children. On each of four other similar charges Neel was convicted and ordered to come up for sentence within two years if called upon. The total amount involved in the charges was £4 17s 6d. Mr. Page made an order that the fine should be paid at the rate of 10s per week.. -..' . -• . On 20th April, said Sub-Inspector Ward, the accused applied to the_ Labour Department for work, and in hi3 application he made himself out to be a married man with a wife and two children dependent upon him. On, the same date he certified on the Department's inquiry, form that the same particulars were true. On those representations he was given employment under the No. 5 scheme. As a matter of fact, he was not a married man at allj and would have been only entitled to two days''work each.week at 9s per day. Actually he received five weeks' work at three days a week for 12s 6d per day. When he was interviewed by the police the -accused admitted that he had made false representations. He said he was living with some people who were in poor circumstances, and thought that by getting' a little, extra money he would be able to pay more money for his board. "Previous to-.this his character has been good," continued the subinspector, "and he had very little work prior to making application to the Labour Department." In a statement to the Magistrate, Neel said that this was the.first- case of its kind in Wellington. Other men had done the same thing, but they had not been prosecuted. He understood that through this prosecution he would become ineligible for work under the unemployment, scheme.