HASTINGS’ WORKLESS

Hawke's Bay Tribune, Volume XXII, Issue 154, 15 June 1932, Page 6

HASTINGS’ WORKLESS

INCREASE IN TOTAL. HOW THE MEN ARE FARING. An increase from 814 to 856 in the numbers of registered unemployed in Hastings is shown by the returns supplied by the officials at the borough yard and covering the periods ended on Saturday and on the previous Saturday. Of the total of 856, married men with three children or more number 177, married men with up to two children 477, and single men 202. The minimum number of members of families thus directly affected is 2,995. 'lho 856 unemployed who make up the total quoted are ail employed on relief works under the No. 5 Scheme, but iu addition there are nearly 100 men employed on farms under the No. IA Scheme, which allows for the employment of workless men to do developmental work of almost any sort. As pointed out in the "Tribune” last week, the regulations covering farm employment have been greatly widened in their scope, and it is now possible for farmers to engage unemployed labour for a great variety of tasks. The onl'y cost to the farmer is the provision of food and accommodation.

The recently introduced scheme for subsidising to the extent of 33 1-3 per cent, the cost of certain building labour will, it is understood, be put into local operation shortly, but so far i,o particulars have been received by the unemployment officials here. The amended system of allotting work under the No. 5 Scheme has been introduced in the larger centres, hut not into the provincial towns. Under the amended scheme there is no standdown week, and the unemployed are given four weeks’ work without a break, the rate of pay being 10/- a day for married men and 7/6 a day for single men. The men do not, however, get a full week’s work in each week. Married men without children get two and a half days’ work and earn £1 5/a week; married men with one child earn £1 10/-, married men with two children earn £1 15/-, and married men with three or more children earn £2. In Hastings the previously existing scale still stands, and employment is rationed on the basis of 12/6 a day for married men and 9/- a day for single men, with a stand-down week. In the centres, married men with children are worse off than married men engaged under the old rates, said Mr A. J. Manson (Unemployment Officer). At present there is no information whether the new rates and system of i ationing are to be introduced in Hastings and Napier. At present the men iu this district aio getting a share of employment that must be considered as satisfactory in comparison with other towns, said Mr Manson. Married men with three or more children under 16 years of age are entitled to four days’ work in each week, and are at present receiving a minimum of three and a half. Married men with up to two children under 16 are nominally entitled to nine days a month, and are receiving a minimum of eight. Thus the men in the firstnamed of those two categories is able to earn (on the minimum basis) £6 11/3 a month, or £1 12/9 each week. Men iu the second category earn £5 a month, or 25/- a week. As already pointed out. the men in the centres work four weeks in the month, and the local men three weeks. Also, in the centres married men without children are put in a separate category (earning £5 in the four weeks), whereas elsewhere married men without children are reckoned as married men with up to two children, and earn £5 in three weeks.

The aim of the officials at the borough yard, Mr Manson explained, is to give every man full-time before his stand-down webk becomes due, and if it is found desirable and necessary to do so, married men with no children are rationed in such a way that an increased ration of work is given to a married man with a large family. The number of children that each man has to support is always made a consideration, said Mr Manson. There is at present no difficulty in obtaining single men for the relief camps. Those men receive three weeks’ work at 18/- a week every month, and have to provide their own food. The works upon which the local unemployed are now employed include a large Rivers Boaid job, several largo jobs for the County Council, and other local body works. There are three catnps for single men, and each camp is under the jurisdiction of the County Council.