THE UNEMPLOYED.

Lyttelton Times, Volume CXX, Issue 14979, 27 April 1909, Page 8

THE UNEMPLOYED.

MEN FOR THE MIDLAND RAILv WAY. FORTY TO GO TO-DAY. In the “Lyttelton Times” of April 17 a letter from the secretary of the General Labourers’ Union was published asking for any information that would lead to the employment of 150 pick-and-shovel men. The editor in a footnote asked tho secretary to forward to him the names of tho men who wanted work, and Mr A. Paterson, the secretary, sent in fifty names on Sunday evening. On Monday the editor telegraphed’to tho Minister of Public Works asking if he could give work to fifty men, and the Minister replied that fifty men could be taken on at the Midland railway works on the Wai-makariri-Ca&s section. Instructions were received by the local. Labour Bureau on Friday, and. a. selection was commenced on Saturday morning. Tho men will be sent to tlie works this morning by the train leaving Christchurch‘at soven o’clock It is expected that about forty men will be sent away to-day. and it is thought that the full complomenji of fifty will not. bo obtained, although tho matter has been before the public for over a week. Of the forty men being sent to tho railway, the majority of them are men experienced in pick-and-shovel work. A small percentage of them are tradesmen, and some arc immigrants who nave been in the dominion some little •time. Married men have been given preference, but most of the applicants are young, single men. The balance of the ‘fifty required, should they apply, will be sent to the works later.