FOUR BODIES

Evening Post, Volume CXXXII, Issue 26, 30 July 1941, Page 9

FOUR BODIES

WOMEN AND CHILDREN

SOCIETIES CONFER

FIRST TIME FOR SIXTEEN YEARS

Four New Zealand Societies for the Protection of Women and Children— those at Auckland, Wellington, Christchurch, and Dunedin—are holding their first Dominion conference for sixteen years,, and remits before «it seek to form a federation of the four societies to bring into being a Dominion organisation, Which-at present does not exist.

The conference was opened today by Mrs. Peter Fraser, and will last three days. Mrs. John O'Shea, president of the Wellington Society, is presiding, Mrs. David Coutts, of Wellington, is the minute secretary, and the delegates are Mrs. A. Hutchison and Mr. D. Donaldson, representing . Auckland, Lady Statham and Mrs. M. J. Forde, representing Wellington, Mrs. Drake and Miss M. Cardale, representing Christchurch, and Mesdames H. F. Norman and H. Atkinson, representing Dunedin.

The remits before . the conference cover a wide range of subjects affecting the welfare of women and children.

After expressing her pleasure at being . able to assist in the work of the society, Mrs. Fraser said she could not avoid a feeling of sadness that such work as that done by the society should be necessary. The society's work had to be carried on at a time when pitiless tyrants were contriving the destruction of women and children, constituting a brutal inversion of the values regarded in this country as fundamental. ' Warfare between civilised peoples should not include the slaughter of women and children. That was not warfare but a diabolic crime, because it struck at the , root of ,human kind. It was inhuman'to strike down the innocent and helpless, and it was anti-human to strike down those upon whom the continuance of the race depended. .

Mrs. Fraser .said that much of the society's work was the concern of the Government, but however well-inten-tioned and determined a Government might be it could not reach everything and everywhere, and the co-operation of private^ people was necessary. It was here that the society was doing very valuable work, which'was greatly admired and appreciated. The members of the society held in high regard the value of human personality and the sanctity of the home. These two things were essential to a democracy, and people who ceased to respect them were no longer free and no longer sane. -