Hitch-Hiking Criticised

Hauraki Plains Gazette, Volume 58, Issue 4105, 25 February 1949, Page 8

Hitch-Hiking Criticised

Hitch-hiking is criticised by a correspondent of the Christchurch StarSun, as follows: “As a motorist whose work carries me over hundreds of miles of South Island roads every week, I wish to draw attention to the growth of the practice of hitch-hiking. When it was confined to young people without much money, who thumbed rides to travel the country on holiday, no motorist could object to it, but today half the people who hold up cars for a lift are merely battening on the motorist, and making a convenience of him to avoid paying fares for more orthodox means of travel. Nobody ipinds helping' a young fellow on his way, but a motorist is entitled to resent the scrounger who demands a lift as a Matter ef right, and, if denied, screams epithets from the roadside.”