UNEMPLOYMENT.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 20992, 3 April 1930, Page 10

UNEMPLOYMENT.

POSITION IN DUNEDIN. PUBLIC WORKS OFFICER TO REPORT. Mr J, Thompson, of the head office staff of the Public Works Department, who was instructed last Saturday by the Minister of Public Works (Mr E, A. Ransom) to proceed to Dunedin to investigate the unemployment problem on the spot, arrived here by the first express from Christchurch yesterday afternoon. Mr Thompson immediately got in touch with Messrs J. W. Munro, M.P., and J. Robinson at the Trades Hall, and it was arranged that he would meet the Unemployment Committee this afternoon at. 3 o’clock at the Trades Hall. Mr Thompson said he had seen in the northern papers that the committee desired to meet him in the presence of the press. To this he could not agree as he wished ■ a round-table talk with the committee. He pointed out that he was sent here merely to obtain information tffi behalf of the Government as to tho acuteness of the Dunedin unemployment problem as represented by the Unemployment Committee. Therefore, he was not empowered to commit the Government to anything until he returned to Wellington and reported on the position to Cabinet. During the discussion that would take place to-day ho might express opinions which, as a Government servant, he would not wish to make public in the meantime. Before Mr Thompson left tho Trades Hall last evening Mr Robinson handed him the unemployment register which the Unemployment Committee had compiled so that he might submit it to any test he might think fit. Mr Munro said that what made him so much concerned about the position of unemployment this year was his knowledge as a member of the City Council of the impossibility of the council spending this year anything like the huge sum it had spent last year on employment. Altogether, including non-recurring expenditure such as flood damage, unemployment, and other sums, the council spent last year a total of £84,000. Again, the Dunedin Drainage Board was also in a much more difficult position than it was last year, when it was able to spend over £90,000 of loan money. This year it had £32,000 of loan money available for the whole year, or until another Local Bill was passed by Parliament empowering the board to borrow money for necessary new works. There was no possibility of getting, such a Bill through Parliament before August or September at the earliest. The position in which the City Council and the Drainage Board found themselves to-day was that they could employ at most 300 men fewer than they employed last year. Unemployment created unemployment, as owing to tho continued acuteness of unemployment during the past three years the council and tho board, in their efforts to relieve the strain, practically doubled their normal expenditure so that in tho last three years they had spent the amount which in normal times would have been spread over a period of six years. “ Therefore." concluded Mr Munro, “ knowing tne local position intimately as I do, knowing that the Dunedin City Council has almost reached its limit, and knowing the largo numner of unemployed people for whom immediate provision must he made, the Government must he compelled, this year, at all events, to provide the greater portion of local unemployment relief.” Last evening Mr Munro received the following telegram from the Minister of Railways (Mr W. B. Taverner) in reply to a communication addressed to him by Mr Munro requesting him to employ some men in the Hillside Railway Workshops':— In further reference to your telegram of March 31 regarding unemployment in Dunedin and your inquiry* whether work cannot be found for men in railway workshops, both as Minister of Railways and a member of Cabinet Committee on Unemployment I am cloaely in touch with the position, and wherever possible arrange for employment to be given. At present juncture, however, the maximum number of men required for work is already engaged in workshops. In this connection I would point out that from October 1 last to March 29 the

Railway Department employed 1276 additional men, 554 of whom were 0 tradesmen, and during that period expended over £160,000 on extra works to provide employment. I may also, say that_ matters are definitely in train with the object of commencing in the south a major afforestation scheme which I am hopeful of having in operation in time to provide employment for a considerable number of men during the coming winter. You will understand, of course, that while I am doing everything possible as an individual Minis, ter to promote employment, the general question of unemployment isjthe province of the Cabinet Committee set up to deal with that matter.—W. B, Taverner.

Mr Munro, commenting on the. above telegram, said that while he did not doubt the figures submitted by the Minister, he was quite sure that a fair proportion of the men mentioned had not been taken on at Hillside Workshops. Practically all the additional men who had been taken on at Hillside were-dis-missed at Chnstmas. Evidently, according to the Minister’s telegram Christchurch was mere fortunate than Dunedin (the Minister’s home town), in that, while apparently the additional men were retained at Addington until March 29, the services of the Dunedin men were dispensed with three months earlier. A FAVOURABLE FACTOR. DOMINION’S POWER OP RECOVERY. (Per United Press Association.) AUCKLAND, April 2. Faith in the capacity of New fJealiHid to. recover rapidly from the dull times now being experienced was expressed fay Lord Bledisloe in his speech at the civic reception at Auckland last evening. His Excellency referred to the wave of unemployment affecting the Dominion, and said he did so because he wisced to point out that unemployment was being experienced throughout the world. He believed New Zealand possessed certain factors which would enable it to pass through that unhappy period more rapidly than most, if not all, other countries which were suffering. Whatever Governmental action might he taken, he thought it behoved ail to do whatever lay in their powe; to mitigate unemployment. He was not going to be bold enough to make suggestions as to how this could be done, but if we were going to be fine Imperialists a spirit of co-operation must actuate all we did.