Gaoled For Not Working

Northern Advocate, 25 August 1943, Page 2

Gaoled For Not Working

(Special) WELLINGTON. This Day. Three weeks' hard labour was imposed on Pieris Zandi, known as Toft Zandi. a Cypriot, by Mr. A. M. Colliding, S.M.. in the Magistrate's Court at Wellington, for failure to perform his work as a cabinetmaker with due dili- ! gence. On three other charges involving embarrassing behaviour toward his employer and fellow-workers, with intent to have his employment terminated, and leaving employment without permission, Zandi was convicted and discharged. The magistrate said the defendant had previously been before the Court for the same type of offence. He was a man who had two separate occupations in which he was skilful. The manpower authorities had seen fit to direct him to work in the furniture trade and not to allow him to work in the restaurant trade.

Persons governed by the manpower regulations, continued the magistrate, were in a very similar position to those mobilised for the military forces and each class had its obligations, with similar penalties for failure to carry them out. Considering that the defendant had previously been fined for not working with due diligence and had thereafter deliberately set out to break the regulations, the only course was to treat him in the same way as a military defaulter and send him to prison.