FEW MORE GO INTO DOMESTIC SERVICE

Gisborne Herald, Volume LXXV, Issue 22655, 4 June 1948, Page 6

FEW MORE GO INTO DOMESTIC SERVICE

Instances of how Great Britain was approaching the stage of New Zealand as far as domestic service was concerned were given in Wellington by Mrs. E. Coventry, J.P., who has returned to New Zealand from England and Australia.

The situation appeared to be a permanent development, said Mrs. Coventry. . . . ....

Despite a domestic service training centre, few went into service now, those thus occupied being for the most part old servants who had acquired the retainer spirit.

Lord George Wellesley, great-grand-son of the Duke of Wellington, had said he lived in a sijiall flat. “You have a batman, I suppose.” Mrs. Coventry suggested. “No, I get my own breakfast and tea. and have lunch at my club." The Bishop of London, whose position entailed much entertaining of visiting clergy and the upkeep of Fulham Palace, had one old man as janitor and three elderly charwomen, who relieved each other during the day Service in even the large business plaoes was given increasingly by older women —in one leading store the New Zealander heard of the retirement of a woman of 80 who had been in direct charge of a department. A constructive aspect of municipal work which impressed Mrs. Coventry was subsidised libraries, museums and institutions where people could prepare themselves for any trade or calling they desired. These facilities extended even to some prisons.