The Hawera Star. THURSDAY, JANUARY 26, 1933. RELIEF WORK OR DOLE?

Hawera Star, Volume LII, 26 January 1933, Page 4

The Hawera Star.

THURSDAY, JANUARY 26, 1933. RELIEF WORK OR DOLE?

Delivered every evening by S o clock in Hawera, Manaia, .Kaupokonui, Otakeko, Oeo, Pihama, Opunake, Normanby, Okaiawa, Eltham, Ngaere, Mangatoki, Kaponga, Awatuna, Te Kiri, Mahoe, Lowgarth, Manutalii, Kakarauiea, Alton, Hurleyville. Patea, Whennakura. Waverley, Mokoia. Whakamara, Oliangai, Meremere. Eraser Road and Ararats*

In discussing unemployment relief towards the end of last year the “St-ai threw out the suggestion that the time had arrived to ensure that unemployed labour should be used only on works of reproductive value, soundly planned, and that the rest of the unemployed should be granted sustenance allowances. This was a revolutionary, suggestion to make in a country which has sturdily maintained, in this connection, “ No work, no pay,” but. we were driven to making it by the revelation, in Auckland and elsewhere, of the huge wastage entailed by unemployed relief works. Under the present system no one can be blamed if work which a private contractor would undertake for a few hundred; pounds costs the Unemployment Board and .the taxpayer several thousands, bivfc the electors and the legislators will be blameworthy if they do not make some attempt to change, the system. When the No. 5 Scheme of relief work was introduced it was merely the best expedient the country could devise for meeting an unprecedented and temporary situation. Unfortunately the situation did no! prove to be temporary and the scheme has been added to from time, to time till now we have an Unemployment Board and a very complicated lot of jerry-built machinery to deal with unemployment at huge cost to the taxpayer. The cost, however, of this form of relief is not its only objectionable feature—it is the waste. We are not only not solving the unemployment problem, but we are not solving the problem of keeping unemployed people out of the grip of hardship and near-destitution, despite our huge expenditure. In commenting on this situation, last- year we asked if it were not- possible for this country to assess for itself the cost of granting sustenance to all those unemployed who could not bo economically absorbed in special works. So far as we are aware, the “Star” at. that time was the only daily' newspaper in the Dominion to advance the suggestion that a straight-out sustenance dole would be 'better than the present pretence of maintaining the “no work no pay” principle. We said then that it was a pretence; no one will deny now that, in the main, the system which purports to give the unemployed an opportunity of maintaining their self-respect byworking for “relief money” and which, further, is supposed to give the community- something of value for the money' spent, is a sham. It is with particular -interest, therefore, that we note that this week several members of the Christchurch Unemployment Committee declared themselves in favour of the adoption of the English “dole” system and thal the Christchurch “Press,” a Conservative journal which does not easily change its views, supports the idea. Several of the members of the committee who favoured the change are men who had been actively engaged in unemployment relief organisation in ■Christchurch for years before the passing of the Act and continuously since then, and therefore their opinions cannot be lightly' written off as emanating from persons who have grown too easily' disheartened. In a leading article on the subject- the “Press” says:

The facts have made it steadily' harder to hold the belief that, while men are demoralised by this form of relief [the dole], their selfrespect and sense of responsibility are preserved by' employing t.h’e'm on relief works. There is a -case still, of course, for carrying on such necessary works as can be financed, and even for anticipating necessity' a little; but the case for any kind of pretence is gone, wlhet'lier it is the pretence of finding useful work to be done or the pretence of doing it. Only' if the Government and the Unemployment Board-are blind will they fail to see that its results are economic waste and social danger, such as it is imperative to check.