UNEMPLOYMENT CONTRADICTIONS.

Evening Star, Issue 21641, 9 February 1934, Page 8

UNEMPLOYMENT CONTRADICTIONS.

Thk meeting of protest against conditions held in the Concert Chamber last evening was probably as representative of the unemployed as its promoters could have expected. It was only a small proportion of them, necessarily, that was present, and there was room for more. On the other band, it was a good deal more representative than a “ mass meeting ” held on the Oval on Sunday to work up a strike atmosphere, ai which anyone with sufficient curiosity might have heard Mr G. Geddes emotionally reciting, to about sixty rather listless-seeming guests sun-scattered on the grass, the woes of a fellow “ slave ” in Invercargill who had thrown up his billet on relief work because he was put on piece rates, which was against all his principles. The mayor advanced some ideas, well deserving of consideration, for the substitution of the number 5 scheme by a general scheme of subsidising industry’, so that, at a less expense to the fund, men employed under it would take home a week’s wages instead of the relief pittance. The mayor’s sympathy no doubt was highly appreciated, but the mayor’s plan was scouted by each later speaker who referred to it for the same reason that they condemned the subsidised building scheme, his praise of which to them was unaccountable. The demerit of the plan was that though thousands, without remunerative work at present, might be helped, a much smaller number of employers would stand also to be benefited, which was, or which ought to be, unthinkable. Cr Silvorstone laid down the Spartan principle that no human being had a right to receive something for nothing unless he was sick; but apparently ho would apply it with a different degree of strictness to employers and employees, since he objected to any test of effort for relief work. A demand pressed on Mr Bromley at Wellington a few days ago was for full trade union rates of pay for all relief jobs—failing that, sustenance at the rate of the 1930 Act, but for the whole year, not for thirteen weeks, as that Act provided for. It is plain that no speaker can ever represent more than a portion of the unemployed. Yesterday’s meeting protested against some men in Wellington and Auckland who are over fifty years of age having to give up relief work for the alternative of a sustenance rate which w’e ourselves would thing beggarly, yet by other relief workers, not yet fifty, that alternative has been sought as a boon. The best word that has been uttered on the whole question was that spoken by Mr Bromley in Wellington, when he said that the board’s great concern was to get back to full-time work under normal conditions, and it was having a great deal of success in that endeavour. The number of men for the w r eek ending January 26 for whom there was nothing better than part-time employment under scheme No. s—namely, 40,000 —was the lowest since April, 1931 —17,000 less than at the peak period. Relief cannot be made so generous that it will prevent men from taking normal jobs when those are open to them, but as the number of the unemployed declines “ cuts,” which have had reason to be felt as almost unbearable during the months of greatest strain on the fund, should he restored, and some suburban rates should be brought nearer, if they cannot be made identical with, those of the cities.