The Gisborne Times PUBLISHED DAILY. TUESDAY, APRIL 28, 1925. THAT HALL-HOLIDAY PROBLEM!

Gisborne Times, Volume LXII, Issue 9997, 28 April 1925, Page 4

The Gisborne Times PUBLISHED DAILY. TUESDAY, APRIL 28, 1925. THAT HALL-HOLIDAY PROBLEM!

I t is to be hoped that, by th's time, the electors of the Borough have heard and read sufficient to enable them to make up their minds on the vexed question of the weekly , halfholiday. On the part of those who clabn that the half-holiday should be held on Saturday, the main plea that lias been put forward is that it is unfair that a section of tjie workers should be required to work on the afternoon of that day when another section is having a respite from its labors and is enjoying recreation in one form or another. That particular argument would, of course, have real strength if it were the ease that the section of workers held to be penalised received r.o half-holiday at all.' But it so happens that workers who have the half-day off on Thursday secure their freedom from work at the period of the working week held by the authors of the principle to be capable of afford'ng the most relief! What lias to be borne in mind, however, is that, since the princ'p'o of a lfaif-ho’iday was inr.de law, manufactories, tlm professions, wholesale merchants and others have changed over to tho Saturday half-holiday. In the interim, too, tho weekly hours of work have been appreciably reduced all round and the need that the authors of the half-holiday principle felt existed for a respite to be given workers in the middle of the week is. today. not nearly so pronounced. We should say, therefore, that the problem now requires to be studied mainly from quite another ang’e. But, before passing on to its consideration, we may point out also that there is not much ah" the pro-Saturday argument that, where a section of the workers have the half-day in the m d■dle, ofrthtv week, the success of sport is : iiibst" seriously' interfered with. I he 'undeniable facts of the matter are that, if the Thursday half-day were abolished, the sports grounds m and around this towft would prove alto-

getlicr too snifill in number and size to accommodate ail the workers who would desire to usd their half-holiday by indulging in one or other of the seasonal sports. Such being the case the opponents of the Thursday halfholiday would have done. hotter it they had broadened their plea to make it apply to leisure and recreation generally. What may, at all events,*- be said in respect of the present arrangement is that important athletic and sports fixtures, whether held on a Thursday or on a Saturday, have never failed to attract large attendances. It is, however, not at all so certain that, it Saturday should now become the day on which the half-holiday is to he observed, midweek /fixtures of that character would, in the matter of attendance, he so highly favored. In some quaiters, it is, of course, suggested that the Saturday half-holiday, if made universal, would bo eventually used as a lever for the introduction of the five day working week. That may or may not he a. sound contention, hut the fact remans that at present, at. any rate, most of the industries and businesses of this Dominion could not bo successfully carried on if there were two non-working days in tho week. The problem, in the long run, must be held to bo:l itself' down to this: Would a change over to the Saturday for the half-holiday interfere, to any appreciable extent, w.th an important section of tire business of the town and, at the same time, he detrimental, to an appreciable extent, to public convenience? Jn tins regard, we firmly hold that it is more or lass useless for either side to the corfrovei'sy to quote the experience olJbther towns with reference to the jJalf-holiday question. What may su t district might r.ofc suit any other 'district. Successive governments have appreciated that fact: hence their refusal to place a general half-holiday law on the statute L? ok of tin’s Dominion. The e’ectors, we feel, cannot lightly dismiss the cla m of so many business-people that no worse time, could have been selected for making a change in the day of the hall-holi-day and, in addition, they should also weigh in the scales the extent to which tJrc closing of so many classes of retmß. business would deir mentally affeejp public convenience.