THE New Zealand Herald AND DAILY SOUTHERN CROSS MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 7, 1936 HOURS AND ENTERPRISE

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXIII, Issue 22517, 7 September 1936, Page 8

THE New Zealand Herald AND DAILY SOUTHERN CROSS MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 7, 1936 HOURS AND ENTERPRISE

While the general aim of the Government's shorter hours policy is to secure for workers the greater leisure that is deemed to be a universal reward of mechanical invention, the immediate purpose is to place more men in employment. That being so, no one can cavil at the decision of the Minister of Public Works not to permit men engaged on public works —the first to be granted a five-day week of 40 hours with the right of making up on Saturday morning time lost during the week —to work for private employers on the Saturday. With characteristic vigour Mr. Semple has issued a warning, and the penalty for disobedience will be instant dismissal. The Minister is all the more justified in taking this stand seeing that higher wages are now being paid for the shorter period of labour. In contrast to this decision is the evident failure of the Minister of Labour, who is now entirely responsible for unemployment relief administration, to reduce substantially the number of ablebodied men who are drawing sustenance allowance. It is quite evident that many men fit for rural tasks and not handicapped by difficult family circumstances from moving are succeeding in remaining in idleness, their attitude of mind probably being that a suitable job must be bi'ought to them, not that they should go to the job. The Government inherited this social problem and so far it has done little to cure it. Its worst consequence is its effect upon the individual. Few men can escape deterioration if, fitted for work that is available, they refuse to engage in it and live upon the bounty of their fellows. It is in this way that the unemployables of the future are multiplied. Mr. Semple has been outspoken on the subject, but not much has yet been done to correct the evil.

The present purpose, however, is to consider in its wider aspects the principle that workers enjoying an increased period of leisure should not use it to pecuniary advantage. Until a few years ago city workers were constantly being advised to live in the outer suburbs where they could have an acre or two of land, keep a cow and a pig, grow vegetables and so on. If Mr. Semple's dictium, acceptable though it be at the moment, were carried to its logical conclusion, workers following this course might face reproof because their home industry was cutting into the field of the dairy farmer, the milk vendor and the market gardener. Actually the principle of one-man-one-job would be allied to the 40rhour week principle. It might be considered wrong for an industrious mechanic with a talent for gardening to produce and sell flower and vegetable plants and seeds, for a man who is handy with tools to build a boat or make a wardrobe for sale, for a bird or dog fancier to make his hobby return a profit by selling stock, for a clerk to keep books or act as the paid secretary of some organisation in his spare time, for the wife of a man in regular employment to keep boarders to help along the family income, or for a member of Parliament, a clergyman or a university professor to accept a fee for speaking over the air. Arguments in plenty could be produced to show that such illustrations are not on allfours with the one-man-one-job, 40-hours-a-week-and-no-more idea, but nevertheless they point to the logical conclusion of it, for it must not be forgotten that the shorter-hour-higher-pay policy is not designed only for an emergency period. It is difficult to decide whether the process is a levelling up or levelling down. Certain it is that the trend is toward the strait jacketing of the people which will bring serious penalties for the nation. It is idle to suppose that humanity in this or any other country is ready for a social system that rejects the age-old principle of extra reward for extra effort. That has been a strong driving force in the development of civilisation, and it still is needed as a stimulus. Without it the spirit of enterprise would be undermined, the display of energy above the average would no longer be i-egarded as a desirable thing. Part of the reward of successful striving is the sense of achievement, but nowhere yet is there any large section of society living so completely in the realm of the spirit that material gain does not count in its standard of values. It is possible that average standards are upward, and that less selfishness will be the outcome. Human nature does change—slowly. But much that might be considered selfish by some idealists was the virtue of yesterday, when a man was applauded for the extra effort which enabled him, for instance, to give his children a better education than he had received and make provision for his old age. So far aB State employment and relief are concerned there always should be full recognition of the fact that there are two obligations. One is to provide for necessity, the other to avoid the pauperising pitfalls of humanitarian effort. Anatole France is one of the philosophers who can be read with advantage on this subject. It should be more widely realised that it is possible by injudicious charity or the distribution of relief funds in a wholesale manner to do a disservice to some of the recipients. Any obligation to aid distress should be paralleled by an obligation on the part of the assisted to pull their weight to the extent of the existing opportunity. This latter obligation is at the moment of equal importance with the obligation on the part of Public Works employees to refrain from taking Saturday jobs to the detriment of the less fortunate.