THE BARMAID QUESTION.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XLIV, Issue 13456, 5 June 1907, Page 6

THE BARMAID QUESTION.

The reference of the Auckland Licensing Committee to the barmaid question has/no" direct legal weight, but it is a straw which shows how

public opinion is going. If the city hotels are wise they will not wait for legislative compulsion before

showing that they are prepared to

accept it. It is in no way a reflection upon the barmaids as a class to

point out that throughout the world there is a strong and growing tendency to exclude them from an occupation which can be better filled by men. There was a time when the avenues •of employment open to women were few and far between, and when they eagerly sought these limited industrial opportunities. But now it is hardly possible to name an avocation for which women are in any way suited where they are not found, and : from many they have

excluded men altogether. Under the circumstances, therefore, it is very naturally and not unfairly asked ! whether the bar work .of city hotels should notbe restricted to men.-,;We do not doubt that were men already in occupation of the city: bars there would not be the slightest suggestion that the, prohibition of women as

barmaids was unjust. Our city bars are men's lounging ', and drinking places, and where men lounge and drink are not the best places in the world for women. That is, of course, quite beyond discussion if the conventions of society are recognised as having anything .to do with the regulating of licensed monopolies.