DISABLED SERVICEMEN

Greymouth Evening Star, 31 October 1944, Page 2

DISABLED SERVICEMEN

TRAINING CENTRE OPENED

CHRISTCHURCH, October 30. - The foundation-stone of the Disabled Servicemen’s Training Centre in Riccarton Road was laid to-day by the Minister of Rehabilitation ,(Mr Skinner). The centre, which is being erected by the Disabled Servicemen’s Re-establishment League, will be used to rehabilitate maimed men by teaching them useful crafts such as cabinetmaking, wood-turning, upholstery, leather work and wickerwork. It will cover 30,000 square feet, and a cafeteria, a library, a recreation room, a bowling green, and a swimming pool are among the amenities to be provided. Mr Skinner said that the’ builders hoped, to have the centre ready for opening within six months.

The fact that the Disabled Servicemen’s Re-establishment League undertook the responsibility of rehabilitating all disabled servicemen who returned to New Zealand was mentioned by the President (Mr J. Murphy), who emphasised that the centre was not going to be a factory but a place where disabled men could learn some useful craft. Fie paid a tribute to Mr Tracy Gough, through whose generosity the League had been able to obtain the site, which comprised about three acres and a-half, and to other organisations' which had assisted m the project. The Minister said that the work of training disabled men was the most difficult job in rehabilitation, the problem being more psychological than practical. He emphasised that it was no use training men to resume civil occupations unless the support of the public was assured. Some men who had been rehabilitated in business were being treated as ordinary business men and were being squeezed out by competition. He urged the business community to realise that rehabiltated men were not ordinary commercial competitors, but returned servicemen, who had been put in business with taxpayers’ money, and who were deserving of all the assistance they could be given.

“SLUM” FACTORY ALLEGED

AUCKLAND, October 31

No work is being done at the Disabled Servicemen’s Re-establishment League’s factory and training centre, Hopetown Street, Newton to-day. The sixty-one employees and trainees arrived at the usual time this morning, but returned home shortly afterwards. They will return to-morrow. The decision to do no work to-day is the last and most direct action the men considered they could take to draw attention to what they described as the .shocking working conditions they have endured lor some years, also to register the strongest protest against delays and neglect of the Government in providing Auckland with a suitable vocational training centre, and the delay, in removing the present centre to more hygienic premises. The premises were inspected by the city sanitary inspector yesterday. The President of the Auckland R.S.A.. Mr. A. P. Postlewaite, also inspected the premises and stated he could only describe them as slums. The premises he said, were actually dangerous and one amputee had been injured owing to a stairway being in an advanced state of decay. The premises would never pass the requirements of the factory Act. It was to the everlasting discredit of the Government that disabled servicemen were, asked to work in what could only be described as a hovel. The roof leaked badly, the place was draughty and damp, sanitary conveniences were inadequate and the only tap on the premises was outside.

Representatives of the men stress that the action taken must not bo regarded as a strike, but as a means to'express discontent, and disgust at the continuance of the highly unsatisfactory conditions.