HOLIDAY FIRE-WATCHING

Otago Daily Times, Issue 25090, 4 December 1942, Page 2

HOLIDAY FIRE-WATCHING

The request that the New Zealand Manufacturers’ Federation should approach the Government with a view to some curtailment of firewatching services over the holiday period is supported by sound reasoning. Official approval has been given to the principle that as far as is practicable the Christmas and New Year holidays should be observed in industry. Periodical opportunities for rest and relaxation have been found in Great Britain to stimulate workers, and the same rule is being applied here, consonant with the requirement of maintaining certain essential services and forms of war work. But, as the local Manufacturers’ Association has pointed out, there can be no proper release from duty of those who, under the continuous fire-watching scheme that is now in operation in the main centres, are required to spend a considerable part of their holiday time in contact with their places of business or with the city blocks to which they have been assigned. If New Zealand was within direct air range of enemy bombers, if Dunedin was London, the obligation of firewatching would, no doubt, be accepted without demur by those who are required to undertake it, as a duty they owed to the community. But, though there is no cause for easy assumptions that what has happened in other countries cannot happen here, it would be difficult to convince the public that the threat of enemy attack, in force or in the form of nuisance raids, is so constant and imminent that a continuous fire-watching service must be regarded as imperative. It is true, as the Minister of Civil Defence stated in somewhat enigmatic terms three weeks ago, that “the real effect of major actions must be considered first by the higher authorities in charge of Allied operations.” The Govern-

ment, Mr Wilson then declared, and later reiterated, was acting on the I advice of “ expert advisers ’’—not i necessarily of “ the higher authorij ties in charge of Allied operations ” I —in insisting on the maintenance of a continuous fire-watching service. The implication of the Minister’s statements is that this country —or at least its main centres of population—may be subjected to enemy attention at any moment. If that were actually so, fire-watching would have to be conceded as a necessity. But the Minister’s promised statement from the War Cabinet, after it had made a complete review of developments in the Pacific, has not been placed before the public. In their now chronic slate of ignorance concerning those questions that are most vital to them the people of New Zealand can scarcely be blamed if they incline to the belief that civilian preparedness can be carried to extremes. The general contention among the members of the public, which has been emphatically stated in Christchurch, is that the firewatching service has reached a stage of efficiency where it could be brought into operation in a very short time should an emergency occur, and that little is gainedwhile much rest is lost and much time wasted—by insistence upon the continuous system. In the absence of more definite and persuasive assurances to the contrary than either Mr Wilson or the War Cabinet appears to be willing to produce, this view may he expected to prevail, and fire-watching will be undertaken reluctantly and somewhat resentfully, particularly over the holiday period. The assumption that fire-watching is being efficiently performed while those to whom the duty is assigned are comfortably asleep in hotels is, of course, too ridiculous to be seriously entertained.