PLUNKET SOCIETY.

Evening Star, Issue 21628, 25 January 1934, Page 14

PLUNKET SOCIETY.

TO THE EDITOR. . Sir, —Since reading the report of the Plunket Council concerning its alleged reasons for asking Miss Pattrick to resign I have been pondering over the question, “ What is a dictator?” Canstriving against the wishes of the person authorised to pay you be called “dictating”? Further, when that authorised person—in this case the president of the Plunket Society—obtains the money to pay you not from her own pocket, but from the public purse, is the duty of the paid employee to obey and in all points agree with the wage donor, or is it her duty to endeavour to serve the public faithfully? It has been stated in your columns —and I have every reason to believe the statement is correct—that the real cause, of the present dissent is that the council, or some members of it, strongly resent Miss Pattrick’s frequent application for some representative of Plunket nursing experience—not necessarily herself—to sit on the council and have the rights that a council member has of free speech, in order that the nurses may be adequately protected. The council prefers to appoint an adviser to the council who can be called on in technical matters and conveniently dropped when she is not wanted. Very handy, but is it just? After all, in the public mind the nurses are the Plunket Society executive not the council, who. arc lay members kindly offering their services in deciding how the £20,205 of Government money and the huge sums collected annually from the public are to be spent. The council are voluntary workers who may turn up at meetings or not as they wish. They may or may not take part in those meetings, as they wish; and they may at a few hours’ notice dismiss lifelong experts, as they wish. Now, councils have to be careful, for mistakes react on their own pockets; but in the Plunket Council any losses, monetary or otherwise, resulting from their whims are cheerfully paid by the Government —in reality by the public. The people who would rise in a body to protect Miss Pattrick, their friend and adviser, dare not, for their reward would be the same ns hers—immediate dismissal. I refer to the 140 fine women who are known as the Plunket nurses, to say nothing of the countless numbers of those trained by Miss Pattrick who are in various branches of the nursing profession, bringing honour to New Zealand in every part of the world to-day. Once again I would ask the question, “What is dictatorship?” —I am, etc., Taxpayer. January 23. ,