STRAIN UPON WOMEN

Evening Post, Volume CXL, Issue 74, 25 September 1945, Page 7

STRAIN UPON WOMEN

WARTIME SHORTAGES

(By Telegraph—Press Association—Copyright.)

SYDNEY, September 24

Some time ago Auckland housewives took things into their own hands and issued summonses against striking gas workers on the ground that the strikes were illegal. Strikes are also illegal in Australia, but that does not prevent them, and in nearly every instance the housewife suffers. No action has ever been taken by Australian housewives against strikers, though on occasions they must have felt entitled to do so. Coal strikes have resulted in less transport, with a consequent drop in household supplies, the stoppage at the Bunnerong * power-house (now in its fourth week) has caused light and power failures, and recurrent strikes of slaughtermen have meant a shortage of meat. There have been loud demands by housewives' associations that food deliveries in the suburbs shall be resumed, because of the strain entailed in carrying home supplies. All through the war years, home providers have had to carry their groceries, vegetables, meat, and other foodstuffs. They have also in many nstances had to stand in queues at shops. COUPONS AND QUEUES. Speaking in the House of Representatives last week, Sir Earle Page (who is a physigian) said it was the opinion of Sydney doctors that queueing up to buy foodstuffs had impaired the health of many middle-aged women. He said: "The giving of a food coupon should be a guarantee of supplies. Today in Sydney, at every suburban shop, though you have coupons you must stand in a queue. If you are not early you get no meat. "This is not because of shortage of meat. It is because of the Government's lack of discipline of slaughtermen and coal miners." One Sydney doctor, supporting Sir Earle Page's statements, added that wartime shopping hardships imposed on women had caused many chronic diseases. "Shopping-bag neuritis," caused by : women over 45 carrying heavy loads from the shops, was becoming more prevalent every day, said the doctor. Miscarriages had increased during the past four years, and this could be traced to the hardships endured by expectant mothers. Women who rushed their housework to get an early place in the queue tended to put an extra strain on their heart muscles, and this in time caused premature heart failure. WOMEN EXHAUSTED. Faced with the impertinence of shopkeepers as well as their hardships, women were physically and mentally exhausted at night. Adequate delivery of goods would eliminate much sickness, concluded the doctor. Periodic shortages of such basic commodities as milk and potatoes are an added worry to the housewife. Milk is recurrently rationed because of drought conditions and the reduction of herds because of farm man-power shortage. A report read at a meeting of the Primary Producers' Union last week said that Sydney needs another 1,000,000 gallons of milk a week. Potatoes disappear from the shops

because of the shortage of shipping and strikes of wharf labourers. Finally, the housewife is troubled to budget for the household at present high prices. Housewives laugh at the Government estimate that living costs have risen only 22 per cent, during the war. As regards the rise in the price of food, they point to the fact that the cost of city meals has increased by 88 per cent.