CANBERRA SLUMS

Gisborne Herald, Volume LXVIII, Issue 20526, 9 April 1941, Page 3

CANBERRA SLUMS

TOUGHER THAfo CHICAGO' “MANY YOUTHS RUINED” Y.M.C.A. MAN’S VIEWS SYDNEY, March 22. Canberra, Australia’s garden capital, hides behind its imposing public buildings, attractive private homes and symmetrically-planned and fiowerlined avenues, a shabby, shameful slum area called the Causeway. While members of the Federal House •debated for several days this week a proposal to build two temporary Secretarial buildings costing £BO,OOO, to meet a wartime rush on Government departmental offices, and their likely effect on the Griffin plan to which Canberra was designed, the secretary of the Canberra Y.M.C.A., Mr. Clive Glover; drew attention to the city’s slums. Boys reared in the environment of the Causeway, he said, were tougher than boys in Chicago, regarded as the toughest city in the world.

Mr. Glover said he had had soma years’ experience in settlement work in Chicago, but he had to come to Canberra —claimed to be an ideal city —to find out just how tough boys could be. In some quarters it was denied that there were slums in Canberra. but the facts were that this environment had been fostered by the neglect of Canberra, and the lives of many youths were being ruined, some beyond recall. Chairs Thrown at Windows On the first night he conducted a meeting in the Causeway Hall, said Mr. Glover, a bat flew into the hall through an open window. Without any regard for how many windows or lights they smashed, 32 boys took off their boots and hurled them at the elusive bat. Mr. Glover said he hqd been informed that more glass had to be provided for repairs to Causeway Hall than for the whole of the rest of Canberra. On one occasion he had seen boys tie chairs in batches of four and throw them at windows.

In Chicago boys seemed t,o rely on evading the police in carrying out some of their activities, but in Canberra it appeared that the police evaded the boys. Mr. Glover said that much of the trouble was traceable to environment.

The Minister for (he Interior, Senator Foil, said that it was the Government’s policy to eliminate the Causeway as soon as possible. Some families had been moved, but shortage of houses had made it impossible to move all. The Government had built 400 cottages in Canberra in the past two years. It now had a big defence programme as well, and could not keep pace with the demand. Evqry week new families were being moved to Canberra, and there was already a waiting list of 300 families wanting houses.