BRITISH SEAMEN

Evening Post, Volume CXXX, Issue 76, 26 September 1940, Page 12

BRITISH SEAMEN

SHEEPOWNERS' FUND

THE SECOND GENERATION

The annual meeting of the New Zealand Sheepowners Acknowledgment of Debt to British Seamen Fund, an organisation formed to help dependants of seamen killed in the Great War, was held in Wellington today. Sir Charles Luke presided.

Speaking to the report {already published), the managing trustee, Mr. T. R. Lees, expressed thanks to the London committee and the Alfred Seamen's Institution. The sons and daughters assisted had done the fund great credit, and after the first year of the present war 25 per cent, of the young-men-who had been brought to New Zealand under the fund were back overseas again with the Navy, Army, or Air Force. By the end of the year 50 per cent, of the boys would be overseas. Every effort must be made to re-establish these boys in civil, life when they returned to New Zealand. Mr. Lees spoke of the great work done in the last war by the fathers of beneficiaries of the fund and of what was being done for the beneficiaries. The sacrifices in the present war would be at least as great as in the last. In eleven months 1,314,000 tons of British shipping had been lost. There had been no attempt to interfere with the work being done by the Navy League and other organisations to give comforts to the men at sea. The purpose of the fund was to assist widows and orphans of sailors who had been killed, and children of incapacitated men. LOOKING TO FUTURE. The work of the fund would go on for many years, and would probably have to be carried out by younger men, but the foundations must be laid now. It would be seen that there had been an accretion of £103,243, and that it had been decided to allocate £20,000 of the funds for work arising out of the present war. It might be possible to double the allocation after all claims from the previous war had been met. Requests had been sent out. to all contributors to the fund, and 230 approvals had been received, showing that probably the consent of the subscribers would be unanimous. Later on it would be necessary to contribute specially to a fund for the survivors of the present war, to which farmers who had gone on to the land since the last war would have the opportunity to contribute. For this later appeal, however, the approval of the National Patriotic Board would be necessary. Sir Charles Luke, speaking of the great sacrifices made by the fathers of the beneficiaries, expressed the opinion , that there was no institution in New j Zealand that could surpass Flock House. He hoped that the later appeal to sheep owners would receive support, and that the dependants of those who made sacrifices in the present war would benefit. Captain F. A. Macindoe, general secretary of the Merchant Service Guild, appealed for comforts to be sent to the men in the ships which took' the produce Home. They were paid much less in those ships than the men on the New Zealand coasts. He pointed out that in New Zealand—and he believed also in the United Kingdom—dependants of seamen who lost their lives received compensation, as also did seamen who were injured. In that respect they were given an equivalent standing with the men of the Navy. NO AUTHORITY. Mr. Lees said that they were all sympathetic with the request, but he was afraid that the fund would not be able to assist in that way. Individually, memt-srs would like to do so, but the fund was definitely for incapacitated men and the widows and orphans of those killed, and the trustees had not the power constitutionally to do ■as was asked.

Mr. Edward Newman was re-elected chairman of the fund.