How Relief Workers are Treated

Northland Age, Volume 1, Issue 10, 11 December 1931, Page 1

How Relief Workers are Treated

Bad Conditions in A waroa Bridge Camp “We’re being treated worse than coolies,’’ say the men ’’ [By the Rev. D. M. Martin] There is a great deal of discontent in the Public Works camp at the Awaroa bridge. “We’re being treated worse than coolies,” said one indignant relief worker. And a visit to the camp shows that there is a good deal of justification for the complaints : conditions at the camp have been bad from the beginning. At the present there are between 70 and 80 relief workers in camp, chiefly from Auckland. They are engaged on road work, removing spoil at a pay of 2id a yard. Naturally, being on contract, they work as hard as- possible, and the highest sum earned in a week is 11/5. And the lowest 6/8. A week! The men are

“found.” A cook is employed at a wage of over £4 a week, and he has two assistants, besides one or two others employed as hewers of wood and drawers of water. The Public Works Dept, allows each man food at the rate of 8/5 a week, but out of this has to come the wages of the cook and his assistants, and the amount actually available for the men’s food works out at about 5/9 a week. The natural result is that the men on the job are having a wretched time. The food is badly cooked and poor in quality. With the exception of potatoes and onions, vegetables are almost total strangers to the menu. The morning meal consists of stew and bread and butter, practically without exception. A lunch for six men consists of the following' : A loaf of bread, half a pound of butter, a small piece of cheese, and perhaps a few scones and a piece of “cake.” A specimen of the cake was secured. It apparently consists of flour, water, currants, sugar and baking powder—-under-cooked. Usually the cake and scones were given to the birds. Dinner is meat roasted or boiled, potatoes and a pudding which the men say usually has to be thrown away. “A nasty, sticky mess,” is their description. Milk and sugar are never on the table. The tea is shockingly weak, and the men are not allowed milk for the midday meal. The camp receives a gallon and a half of milk a day—for 70 men! The cooking facilities are most primitive. A can a foot wide and 18 inches high is expected to provide tea for the multitude ; the utensils are most inadequate ; there are no facilities provided for storage and

the result is that the meat goes bad and the bread goes stale and a good deal of food has already been “dumped.” Sometimes the men have to go without the greater part of their “dinner” for one reason or another. One night, for instance, the food was covered with kerosene. Everyone agrees that, with the small supplies of food available and the inadequacy of the cooking facilities, the cook is not to be blamed. It is not exaggerating to say that almost every man in camp is complaining about the state of affairs. Another cause for complaint is that the only water available is a, nearby creek with much cattle on its banks, and in which small boys swim. The latrines and refuse pits are not 20 yards from the cookhouse. The men complain that there are no shelter tents on the job, and that often there is no shelter whatever from the rain. The camp has a small ambulance kit—which is always kept at the camp, no matter how far away the men may be. The only amusement the men get is in the way of newspapers supplied by neighbouring farmers. The men are expected to supply their own blankets —one man, blanketless, sleeps under a tent-fly. The sleeping arrangements are not very comfortable, but adequate. The dining room accommodation is far too

small, and men have sometimes to eat their meals in the tents. The men in the camp say that not long ago a Public Works car from Okaihau, containing several men, drove up, the men got out, measured the dining-table, “for oilcloth” they said, got in their car and drove away again! A last complaint is that on election day no facilities were given the men to go to the nearest booth 6 miles away to vote. A lorry came for two surveyors and drove away practically empty. The men walked, or paid a hardly-earned 1/ (representing nearly a day’s work) for the privilege of voting. The authorities in Whangarei have been appealed to on several occasions to improve matters at the camp, but the appeals have been disregarded. The men have a genuine grievance ; it is as if someone, seeing a hungry dog appealing for food, flung it an old bone much the worse for wear, saying : “It hasn’t any meat, but be thankful you’ve got even that!” You may laugh at this, but it happens to be true : An old man was found by his mates to be weeping. He told them he wanted to be back home, and when they said “Where’s your home?” the reply was “The Doss House!”