SATURDAY HALF-HOLIDAY.

Evening Star, Issue 12396, 9 January 1905, Page 4

SATURDAY HALF-HOLIDAY.

TO THE EDITOR Sir, —In your issue of Saturday I saw a letter about the Saturday hatf-hoiiday, Mid as the time js drawing near when the matter will be fixed up, I hope a little interest will be taken in the question, and the right and proper day selected. If I remember the circumstances correctly, the matter last year was dealt with in the following, manner:—As the Government were under a promise to deal with the weekly half-hoUday in the following session, the present /arrangements, as then existing, were not interfered with, but this year the arenmst&nces are different. The* Government having shelved the question, af a universal halfholiday, it becomes the duty of the local bodies to so act in this matter that the best interests of the community will be served. Saturday is .certainly "the" day, as a section of the traders who have adopted that day find out; and it >is certainly the best day for the workers, for whom the holiday is mostly meant. I think if a petition in favor of Saturday were put in circulation it would obtain a large majority of the workers' signatures, and I should like to make'a special appeal to those who have the half day on Saturday themselves not to shop on that particular afternoon, as by abstaining therefrom they will show a right and proper spirit, inasmuch as what they have themselves they do not grudge others trying to get. Their wives and daughters, too, should remember this, as, if I may be allowed to use the term, they are the greatest offenders. In Dunedin' now you will find half the shopkeepers dosing on Wednesday and half on Saturday. On Wednesday it means a dislocation of business for a few hours; ou Saturday it meadf a good holiday and lestI should like to see some of the unions and associations of workers take the matter up and help a little by passihg resolutions iu favor of Saturday, and pledging themselve* to help the movement as much as possible. Trusting the matter will not rest here, but that it will he well thought out, .and the best day (namely, Saturday) chosen—l am, etc., Sattjbdat No. 2.