PUBLIC WORKS CAMPS

Hawera Star, Volume LII, 29 May 1933, Page 4

PUBLIC WORKS CAMPS

EXPLANATION BY MINISTER. PAY AT TEN SHILLINGS DAILY. (By Telegraph—Press Association.) WELLINGTON, May 27. Approached by a pressman with reard to Public Works camps Mr J. -S. .Tessep, deputy-chairman of the Unemployment. Board, said that the only change in circumstances was that the rate of pay was now based on 10s a day. A close investigation recently made showed that for the period froni July last to March 31 an average of £3 a week was fairly well maintained, -being exceeded in some cases. The work offered at 10s a day in Public Works Department camps was not relief work. It was normal employment at the ruling rates of pay. The Unemployment Board’s funds were subscribed from the pockets of the citizens, thousands of whom were themselves little better off than relief workers. The duty of the board was to -care to tne best of its ability for the margin of surplus labour that remained when all the normal employment was filled.

The board had no legal responsibility to the men who refused such normal employment. The Public Works Department camps, where 10s a day was paid, came under this heading. The board had therefore to hold that if any able-bodied man declined without adequate reason -work that was offering he himself absolved the -board from further responsibility towards him. -The condition of unemployment, became voluntary, and the board could deal only with involuntary unemployment.

Discussing camps maintained by the Unemploymen t Relief Board Mr Jesscp said that the remuneration was necessary lower. As the work could not be brought to the city relief worker, there was no alternative but to take him to the work. There was nothing unusual in- a man absenting himself from home for periods w'hen it was essential to provide for his wife and family.