LANCASHIRE LASSES

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXV, Issue 23160, 5 October 1938, Page 4

LANCASHIRE LASSES

ARRIVAL IN MELBOURNE A- THREE-YEAR CONTRACT Interesting t arrivals in- Melbourne recently were 15"Lancashire lasses,''' all textile workers", who went to Australia under a three-year contract .to a largo, textile firm; They were chosen from about 300 who applied in answer to an advertisement in a Manchester newspaper. All are skilled workers and each girl had to pass fi medical test* before her appointment was confirmed. • The girls expect tb get a minimum wage of £3 a week in Melbourne./Phero was no minimum wage in Lancashire, hut the £1 19s which was earned in ft week* for piecework by Miss Teresa Ashurst, one of the six who- hailed i'rom the town of Rochdale, would go further than her Australian wqge umlei; English living conditions. Most of the girls play some kind of sport; one actually being a footballer. She is a ;Soccer' enthusiast, playing centre-fouward, and hopes to form a football team in Melbourne. All are fervent ; admirers of Gracie Fields, especially the six girls who come from Rochdale. Miss- Fields' home town. They told how a rich man wanted to pay'to have a picture of Gracie Fields painted tcJ hatig in the local art gallery, but there was an outcry from the mill girls, Who wanted to pay foxit themselves; Everv cotton mill girl in Rochdale paid ,a shilling a head and, although 15,000 shillings was wanted, double that sum was obtained.' ,