IN THE COUNTRY

Northern Advocate, 2 July 1935, Page 8

IN THE COUNTRY

WORK WHEN IT COMES “NOT AT YOUR BACK DOOR.” HINT TO UNEMPLOYED. 1 | “We are anxious to get rid of No. 5 Scheme, and may do sk, t soon,” said Mr W. Bromley, chairman of the Unemployment Board, when speaking to relief workers at Hikurangi last night. “But remember that full-time jobs, when they come, will not he at your back doors. Developmental work is only to be found in the country, and it is in the more remote districts that camps will have to be established.” Opahi Camp Condemned. Stringent criticisms of the Public Works Department relief camp at Opahi, where many men from Hikuragni either went voluntarily or were drafted, were expressed by members of the deputations which waited upon Mr Bromley. “The camp was a disgrace to any Government or any body of men, ’ said one lady, the wife of an unemployed worker. “No man should have been asked to live or work there.” Mr R. Nesbitt, chairman of the Town Board, who presided, said that the men had only been prevailed upon to go into camp with considerable difficulty. The weather had been atrocious and the conditions awful. Many of the men had only received £2 2/6 per month, and when they returned to Hikurangi they found that they had done little, if any, better than those men who had remained on No. 5 Scheme. However, they had been deprived of the issue of boots and blankets and other privileges extended to No. 5 Scheme workers. Although they had only made relief pay, they had been required to pay the levy in full. Mr Nesbitt asked that the contract system in Public Works Department relief camps be abolished in future, and the men be given an opportunity to earn at least 10/6 per.day. A deputation from the wives of the unemployed and later from the men supported these requests. Requests Partly Met. Considering the special conditions, Mr Bromley" said he would arrange the issue of blankets and boots to those who had been in the Opahi camp. The levy payment was mandatory by law. To the women’s deputation, Mr Bromley pointed out that such camps as Opahi were run under Public Works Department conditions, and were not connected in any way with the Unemployment Board. The board, however, by subsidising wages, had been endeavouring to stimulate the creation of full-time employment at standard rates of pay, but whether these works were undertaken by the Public Works Department, ' local bodies or private enterprise, the conditions and standards' were those of the employing authority. . He understood that the rates of remuneration allowed under the Public Works Department contract system were calculated on the average rainfall in a district, and it ap- , peared that at Opahi abnormal weather conditions had been experienced. Seven floods in five months were not conditions which could usually be associated with the Winterless North. In other centres, men on subsidised piecework jobs were making fairly good wages, and he instanced the average earnings of 13/4 per day by those engaged on the New Plymouth aerodrome. Opahi, evidently, had been a very unfortunate exception. “Callous Neglect.” The matter was also referred to by several members of the relief workers’ deputation. “It was 11 days before either the foreman or the engineer came on the job,” said Mr E. Coulson. “It was a case of callous neglect. The Public Works Department expected our families to live for the first five weeks on £2. I never worked harder in my life, but my earnings on the contract rates set by the Public Work Department were only £4O in 24 weeks. When a deputation from the men went to Whangarei to wait upon the District Engineer, Mr Ronayne, they were told he was not in. When we telephoned to the engineers or anyone in charge of the job, the receiver was banged up as soon as they found it was men from the Opahi camp.” Mr T. Dunn, entering an appeal that relief camps should not be compulsory, remarked: “It savours of the conscription of labour when men are forced to accept work in them or be threatened with starvation.” “This is a matter for legislative enactment,” said Mr Bromley, “and outside the board’s scope.” _ Mr Bromley said that on his arrival in New Zealand in 1912 he was pleased to work in a Public Works Department camp for 9/ a day. Necessity made it as compulsory then as it was to those who were registered unemployed today. Those well-intentioned, but ill-informed agitators who con- j demned men who accepted camp jobs j as “the blackest of scabs," were notj doing a service to their fellow unemployed. District Engineer Replies, When the criticism of Opahi camp was brought under the notice of the District Engineer this morning, he declined to comment further than that / men, not from Hikurangi, working close by, had made good money.