SERVICE IN THE HOME

Evening Post, Volume CXXIV, Issue 108, 3 November 1937, Page 27

SERVICE IN THE HOME

There are now thirty-four training centres in England for girls wishing to enter domestic service, maintained by the Central Committee on Women's" Training and Employment, with the aid of a Ministry of Labour grant. The number of girls wishing to enter has fallen considerably during the past year. In September last year, and during previous years, there was a long waiting list. Now, although there is accommodation for more than 900, there are only 663 girls in training. It has been found impossible to persuade': girls to enter. Mr. Brown, Minister of Labour, stated recently in the House of Commons that the labour exchanges had been able to fill only 44 per" cent, of the domestic service vacancies notified. The Ministry receives scores of letters from women offering advice on how to meet the shortage, and many national schemes have been suggested. These include contracts between employers and servants guaranteeing time off and fixed hours of work for every day. The "League of Good Mistresses" is another suggestion, and this is one Mr. Brown seems inclined to try first. ESCAPE INTO FLATS. One difficulty you know little of In j New Zealand is the "stairs bogy.-' Most of London's homes for many

generations have been built four storeys high. The usual plan was to have the kitchen and maid's room in the basement, which got little or no sun or, daylight, and was often damp and cold. On the ground floor was the drawing-room and dining-room, a hatch was raised, and the food came up on a lift through.the floor from the kitchen. On the first floor were the principal bedrooms and bathroom. Up one more flight and you came to the nursery floor, with day and night nursery, nurse's room, bathroom; and perhaps a small kitchenette. Four flights of stairs! This adds much to the work of running a house, and is one of the most tiring features of it. Since flats have come into vogue, many' of these houses have been reconditioned inside, and each floor is now a flat. Having less room, many people with small families are content with a daily maid, who sleeps at home. These old houses provide more spacious flats than the modern boxes which are going up in thousands, but they often lack the conveniences that one has to pay highly for in the new blocks, such as central heating, refrigerators, etc. There is keen competition between these old and new flats, and the other day I was through two old houses which are being converted by a woman who has already made a name for herself with this, work, and she had installed central heating and cupboard room, which is often missing from new flats. I feel sure that millions of pounds will be lost over some of these , pew speculative ventures, because the speculative builders are too greedy; they ask too much and give too little. And I am convinced' that flat-dwelling is a contributory factor towards many divorces. Where people are living on top of each other, nerves get frayed, argument starts, and there is no escape. At one time people could ' work off a. bad humour in the garden or go upstairs or downstairs. But not now. They have no place to go, and their mood ferments in these tiny heated boxes they call home. NOT SOUND-PROOF. And life is so restricted in them, and without restriction they are intolerable, so it cuts both ways. In some blocks you can't have a piano or other musical instrument, because it disturbs the neighbours. I know people who have been driven from place to place because they could not use a piano, and there was no opportunity of practising their music. Singers, too, are most unpopular. Wireless, however, which supplies much of our modern approved noise, seems immune from these restrictions, and on a summer night with the windows open you will hear several different programmes at .nee, clashing into a hideous din. Some flats won't allow dogs, and quite rightly I think, for it is inhuman to keep dogs in a flat without any place for a run. In others, where they are permitted the yapping of some :stilential Peke nearly drives the neighbours mad. And so '' it goes on. The servant problem has driven people to seek I.fug? in flats, and now they are beginning to realise ' at what cost they have surrendered a ' real home with all it means to a i family. The falling birth-rate is an- ' other result. Many flats' won't take ' families with young children, because i they annoy their neighbours. : X.. ona~»kuMU«.Jcaoiv on fcnmtm hunfenJ s

ENGLISH TRAINING CENTRES

(By Nelle E. Scanlan.)

THE REACTION

[even when I hava no personal interest in the search. Recently I have been through several blocks of luxury I flats, where a sitting-room, diningroom, three bedrooms, maid's room, j bathroom, and kitchen cost £14 a week. There are thousands of people paying that rent in London and getting little ' -il home'comfort even at that price. Oh, yes, there is a uniformed commissionaire at the door to hop up and open the car, take your parcels, and hold an umbrella over you up the steps if it is raining. And you can get a meal in the restaurant, ar you iced keep only one maid. But life in these is just one remove from hotel life, aud two removes from sitting on a railway station with your luggage. A three years' lease, and you move on to find something better. I have seen quite a number of the new small flats with one sitting-room about the size of a packing case, a dining-room, or perhaps a folding dining table in the small entrance hall, a wee bedroom, bathroom, all very modern, kitchenette, wi'* refrigerator —no home is complete without one, now, though there is not more than one month in any English year when you really need it—and all for about £3 or £ 3 10s a week. Add to that the roar of .traffic " neath your window, the tramp of feet over your head, the

sound of voices and wireless through the walls, and the total absence of that garden where you can go out and eat worms when driven to desperation!

A reaction; has, however, set in against flats. : Oi.e vast block near me, I see, has let only two flats out'of 48. Another is just nearing completion. Speculative builders and companies, I believe, are beginning to sense a change in the wind: I read with delight only yesterday that 15 acres of an old «ftate. has come into the market in St John's Wood, Just near Lord's cricket ground. Already two great blocks of flats have been erected on this estate, the houses being pulled down as the lease fell in. But there are to be no more" flats on this property. Th- fifteen acres of now oldfashioned houses ia to be cleared, and 84 modern "gentlemen's residences"' with gardens, are to take their place. I could have whooped with'joy when I read it, and I will watch their progress with extreme interest, though -I shall not be the owner or tenant of any of them. It shows- a return to sanity, and an appreciation of what a home really means in family life. These houses will not have basement kitchens, they will have attractive living and working quarters for the domestic staff, and should have little difficulty in solving their own domestic problem. They will have drawing-room, dining-room, kitchen,, and perhaps a small sitting-room on the ground floor, bedrooms on the first floor,1 and comfortable rooms for the staff on the second floor, centrally heated, electrically, run, all modern conveniences and Ihbour-saving devices—and a garden. During the past year, a few wise people have experimented in this type of modern home, and the demand for their has been, enormous. Flats have proved an expensive economy to many who were constantly driven to weekend in the country or elsewhere, to get away from thei? little boxhome to get a breath of fresh air, to give the children a chance to play. Now they will have their own garden and lawn. , . . Flats are a necessity in big congested areas, but the mushroom growth of suburban villas, often rather terrible looking and jerry-built, is draining the population from the centres of work. They would rather travel an hour by motor-coach or underground morning and night in order to have some freedom of movement and simple recreation 'sfter working hours. And those whose work can be done anywhere, and the vast army of retired business people, are scouring the countryside looking for country cottages, old barns to convert (these have solidly-built old brick walls to start with), and tmany a derelict has been transformed into a charming home. A HOME IN THE COUNTRY. It is an interesting fact that all the talent of the world pools into London; anyone with talent or ambition comes to London in search of fame and fortune—artist, writers, actors, singers, scientists, men and women with special ability in any way of life. But as soc* as they make enough money, they can't get out of it fast enough; they want a cottage in the country. You may have noticed that the English landed classes and aristocracy always snaalc oC thai* "anunimr Jiaroa" and -