LETTERS TO THE EDITOR

New Zealand Herald, Volume 80, Issue 24759, 6 December 1943, Page 2

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR

Returned Railwaymen » Sir, —In an appeal before the Auckland Industrial Manpower Committee an officer of the National Service Department is reported as stating that men of the Railway Unit were given to understand, on Enlisting, that on completion of their army service they would be required to return to the Railways Department. In my own case, together with many others, I enlisted before the unit was thought of. When it was formed 1 was drafted into it with no threats or promises as to what would happen after the war. The railwayman gets enough abuse without misleading statements being made. Hamilton. A. G. R. Longman. Payment to Next-of-kin by R.N.Z.A.F. Sir, —What do you suggest is a reasonable time next-of-kin of airmen killed on active service overseas should be required to wait before their accounts are settled by the Air Department? My son, an officer in the Royal New Zealand Air Force, was killed in an aircraft accident in England over a year ago, and, although application has been made to the Air Department for a' statement respecting the amount due to the deceased youth's estate, no definite advice has been received. His next-of-kin have been informed that "the department was awaiting a statement of accounts from England. It is known that there must be about £2OO due to tlie estate, but so far not one penny has been received or accounted for. Perhaps some of your readers whose sons have suffered the same fate might be able to throw some light on the position or offer suggestions as to how the matter can be rectified. Parent. Grading of Cream Sir, —Mr. A. P. Lee's contention that "the aggregate payment by the company to its suppliers is in 110 way affected by paying less for low-grade cream," is no sort of answer to those who feel that they are being paid less for high-grade cream. No one doubts that the less a company makes available by way of advance payment, the greater the deferred payment will be; the aggregate payment, as Mr. Lee points out, will not be affected by this procedure, but the distribution of that aggregate, where grading is too severe, very definitely is. Let us examine more closely his illustration of the superefficient A who supplies nothing but finest cream and is unfailingly credited with it —no mean feat in itself —tho average unfortunate B, who, try as lie will, gets nothing but first grade on his dockets, and the hapless C, who, doubtless including his bowl scum and the occasional rat or scrubbing brush, score's a consistent second. Lot us leave him out of it and concentrate on A and B. A has received £2O for his all-finest cream, B £l9 3s 4d for his all-first; both are to receive deferred payments of £4 3s 4d. But if B's cream was really finest all the time and he has been knocked back under too severe grading —and this is the prevalent complaint with which Mr. Lee makes no attempt 1o deal —then hv rights he, too, should have received £2O by way of advance payment, and the total available for distribution as deferred payments would he correspondingly less. In this instance, the deferred payments coming to A, B and 0 would be £3 17s 9d, instead of £1 3s 4d. So the aggregate payments of A and B should be, not £24 3s 4d and £23 6s 8d respectively, but £2l? 17s 9d each. In other words, A has been overpaid 5s 7d and B underpaid lis Id, or, to put it in percentages, A received a little over 1 per cent too much, and B nearly 2 per cent too little. Where hundreds of pounds are involved this is no small matter, and it must be clear that the unduly severe grading of. cream can make a difference to tho individual, True, the dear old factory aggregate may not be affected, but who cares about the factory aggregate if he is not getting his fair share of it? The province- wide feeling of dissatisfaction with the present grading of cream suggests that there are a great many farmers in the unhappy position of Mr. B. If the farmers would only take a lesson from the miners they would have every gradpr discharged who ventured to give anything less than finest. I.G.G.S,