THE UNEMPLOYED

Grey River Argus, 17 September 1937, Page 9

THE UNEMPLOYED

POLICY OF GOVERNMENT Outlined by Minister “MOST PRACTICAL IN WORLD.” WELLINGTON, September 16. The steps taken by the Government to relieve unemployment since it came into office were outlined by the Acting Minister of Labour (Mr P. C. Webb) in reply to statements made by Mr S. G. Holland (Opposition, Christchurch North), during the Imprest Supply debate in the House of Representatives. “It was rather amusing to listen to Mr Holland’s denunciation ol the Government’s unemployment policy,” Mr Webb said- “He quoted from a speech in which I said that if Labour got into power it would not be long in finding work because there was any amount of it to be done. 1 believe that is possible still, and I am sure it will soon oe done. But when I made that speech I did not realise the mess in which the last Government had left the country. Single men were herded into camps at 10s a week. They had no home life and they were denied a chance of learning a trade. Are there any of those camps to-day ?”

Mr Holland: There are people in the same position. The Minister: You know that in Christchurch the doors of members of Parliament were besieged by mothers and lathers trying to get work for their children.

Mr W. A. Bodkin (Opposition, Central Otago): It is the same today. On the other hand, the Minister continued, factories and warehouses were crying out for boys and girls. Over 8,000 more had been employed in factories during the past year or so. The number of apprentices in New Zealand had ‘fallen from 10,000 in 1928 to 3,000 in 1933. Mr Holland gave the Government no credit for rehabilitating thousands of these young men in employment, for breaking up the slave camps and for providing conditions on publicworks which excelled those of any other country in the world. The member for Central Otago had been telling the people about the mess into ' which the country was drifting, the Minister continued, yet throughout Central Otago now there was an almost complete absence of unemployment. Mr Bodkin: That is not so.

The Minister: I met local bodies and offered them up to £4 a week to employ men; yet there were very few jobs to be done. Under the system which had now been inaugurated, Mr _Webb said, every unemployed man in New Zealand' who was' able to work would at least get a few months’ work this year. Local bodies which had experienced difficulty in getting money for necessary works had been offered the money and the men to do that work. The Labour Department was anxious to provide assistance to local bodies to help backblock settlers. That . had never been done, by a previous Government.

Mr Holland: How many men are on sustenance doing nothing ? The Minister: About 19,000. of whom at least 10,000 are unemployable.

Contrasting the conditions now with those ruling under the last Government, the Minister said there was work to-day for young people, and he thought the Government would be able to rescue 5,000 or more young men deprived of the opportunity Io learn trades during the depression. Farm work had been subsidised and the Government had agreed to subsidise industry, especially the building industry. _ It was setting up schools to train young men > who had missed their chance, and he believed that with the cooperation of industry it would be possible to rescue many of those who had been cast adrift by the policy of the previous Government. ‘•No problem is so big that it cannot be solved,” the "Minister continued, “because we have laid down a more practical policy than that of any other Government in the world. No other country pays half the amount in sustenance that we do, although we agree that sustenance is wrong in principle and is demoralising. We want to evolve schemes of work, and I think that reasonable members of the Opposition will agree that the work that is now being done is creating assets for the nation.” Mr Hamilton: What about the farm labour scheme ? Mr Webb: We are doing our best to induce men to go on to farms, but the farmers have a duty, too, and they must provide reasonable accommodation and social amenities. Mr Holland: What about the sustenance rates ?

Mr Webb: That is not affecting the position. The men must take work if it is available. Emphasising the Government's efforts to assist the Maoris, the Minister said that there were no Maoris in the counh’v able to work who could not get full-time work at the .present time clearing Native lands. It. was costing £270,000 a year to help the Maoris. The Government had recently made arrangements for 40 men in Christchurch who were not lit for ordinary work to undertake nursery work on a scale that might enable trees for beautifying purposes to be supplied for the whole of the Dominion, Mi' Webb concluded. He could assure Mr Holland that, iii spite of his figures, 14,000 men had been found work in the past year, and if the schemes of the Government received the co-operation they deserved he believed that marked progress could be made in the future.