Working for Rations

Manawatu Times, Volume LIV, Issue 7241, 22 August 1933, Page 8

Working for Rations

DIFFERENT VIEWS BEFORE CITY COUNCIL A deputation consisting of Messrs. Redward and l r ule waited on tho Palmerston North City Council last evening protesting against the council’s policy of finding work for those on relief. Mr. Redward said he thought the council was commercialising charity when it asked a man to work for the mere pittance of rations only. If there was some value in the work, then ratepayers were getting something for nothing. Further, working for rations was diminishing the work available for men on relief and was bringing the compulsory camps closer for manj. Mr. Yule spohe 'on similar lines and both speakers paid tribute to the help that tho council and Mayor had given in the past. Answering Cr. Free, Mr. Redward said it was scarcity of work that had prompted him to protest primarily. As far as tho working off of electric and gas accounts owed the council was concerned, that was on a different footing. It was a business proposition for the council as also was the working for rations if the council got something out of it, in which case the council should make a contribution.

Cr. W. B. Cameron reminded the deputation that the council had made quite handsome contributions to the-re-lief depot in the form of wood from its reserves and had set aside land for the growing of vegetables. The Mayor said he was extremely sorry that members of the relief -workers should come along and put up the statements the council had heard. The sympathies of the council and Central Relief Committee were definitely with No. 5 workers and any scheme put into operation had that idea at the back of it. He had had men come to him and stated that they wanted work and not charity and that if they could not work for the clothes and rations they received they would not take them. “I want to impress on you and members of the council, the difficult position we are in,” stated the Mayor, who added that when people had come to him asking if they could get somebody to work for them in return for some gift to the depot, he had at onco refused. Ho was afraid that if the representations made by the deputation wero persisted in, relief workers would lose a largo volume of sympathy. The only way the workers could show r their appreciation was by working for what they received The Mayor also mentioned the different ways in which the council had been contributing to the relief depot and expressed his own opposition to married men being sent into camps unless sufficient inducement was held out to them. Mr. Redward said the deputation had not come along in any spirit of vindictiveness as it was fully appreciative of what the council, Mayor and citizens had done and were doing for relief -workers.