RURAL RELIEF CAMPS

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXX, Issue 21469, 18 April 1933, Page 6

RURAL RELIEF CAMPS

THE BASIS OF EARNINGS CONDITIONS REVIEWED DISABILITIES EXPLAINED BY ISOLATED The Minister of Employment, thfc Hon. A. Hamilton, is reported to have stated in Auckland recently that he could not understand the difficulty of getting men to go to the Public Works camps in the country, where men could have a full week'o work at 10s a day. The Minister certainly qualified this later by saying the men were engaged on piece work, based on 10s a day. Of course, the two propositions are vastly different, and the Minister was unfortunate in so loosely expressing himself. • v Nevertheless, even men paid on the basis of 10s a day do not actually receive what that should represent at the end of a month. They are not paid anything for compulsory holidays and for time lost through bad weather, sickness or minor injuries. Furthermore, they have deducted from their earn-,, ings, on the basis of 10s a day, the wage tax; they pay the unemployment levy, while the incidental of the sales tax and high exchange rate deprives them of a further amount fully equivalent to the wage tax. Little Differentiation Then, again, piece work, on the cooperative contract principle, under which relief workers are ostensibly employed at the country camps run by the Public Works Department, does not in--practice get paid strictly on that basis. From actual experience on such works it can be definitely shown that the pay is averaged out among members of the gangs, instead of there being differentiation between efficient and inefficient work. For instance, the highest known pay for a first-class gang doing the usual navvy work has been at the of Is 0.6 d an hour, and that was for quarrying, while it is extremely rare for even the most backward gang, showing the least work accomplished, to fall below Is l.od an hour. To give a specific instance: On a road construction job where five gangs were engaged upon two miles of formation No,. 1 gang, composed of conscientious toilers with the guidance of an experienced headman, had the hardest sections of the work selected forth em. When the two miles was com--pleted and the aggregate yardage measured up an analysis of the job showed No. 1 gang had actually completed onethird of the entire work. However, as pay days came round the members of this most efficient gang only received from ljd to 2d per hour more than the majority of other workers, while even the most backward gang, who left an unsatisfactory section, which had to be gone over after them, received well over a shilling an hour. That surely is offering poor inducement for men to give of their best, and, to say the least, is disheartening, besides being hardly in keeping with the spirit of contracting on a co-operative basis. Transport and Rations Another handicap at some of the more remote country camps is that men have deducted from their first pay the cost of their transportation on to the job, and must find their own return fares, while there is no allowance either in time or money made to enable the men to visit their families at, say, JChristmas or Easter. It is considered unreasonable that many relief workers in isolated camps, who went home at Christmas have been unable since then to save enough to pay their fares to visit Auckland at Easter, and they consequently have no option but to remain in camp, while not being allowed to earn anything for three days of enforced idleness, namely, on Good Friday, Easter Monday and Anzac Day. A member of the Unemployment Board is also reported to have declared that men in the country camps are living well at a cost of 8s a week. This is quite a ludicrous statement for anyone in authority to make. The truth is that the average cost of living in most country camps is much nearer double that amount, when allowance is made for a few ounces of tobacco a week and the necessary expenditure on working boots and clothing. It is worth noting in this connection that men in Public Works camps are debarred from any benefit from the Municipal Unemployment Relief Committee and similar organisations. Neither are thoir families allowed to participate in the cheap meat and other food supplies available to ordinary relief workers. Exploitation Alleged Regrettable though it is to have to. say it, the fact remains that many men in country camps are being exploited by settlers, upon whom they are dependent for certain necessities. They have to pay dearly for meat, vegetables, eggs, milk and the like, while groceries are considerably more expensive than in the city on account of high freights on parcels or the extra price charged by country storekeepers. Thus it would appear the Minister of Employment and the Unemployment Board are not fully conversant with the conditions that obtain in country relief camps in, at least, the Auckland v Province. This is written in no carp- sj ing spirit nor with a view to ventilat- § ing grievances; but only with a desire that the circumstances should be more generally known. Indeed, life in these camps is by no means as drab or "deplorable" as some people, from ulterior motives, try to depict them. The great majority of men in theso relief camps realise only too well the abnormal state the country's finances are in and the sorry plight of most of their fellow citizens, with the result that they, for their part, are loyally "doing their bit" by carrying out work they consider is definitely developmental and likely to be of lasting benefit to the Dominion. Thus they can preserve their self-respect and" are prepared to await the opportunity of rehabilitating themselves in their former trades and callings. They certainly want no agitators to espouse their causa, distort facts and misrepresent alleged grievances.