DECLINING BIRTH RATE

Otago Daily Times, Issue 25561, 14 June 1944, Page 4

DECLINING BIRTH RATE

GRAVITY OF PROBLEM AN AGEING POPULATION (P.A.) WELLINGTON, June 13. The Dominion Settlement Association has sent a cablegram to Dr Edith Summerskill, a member of the House of Commons, who is now with the British parliamentary delegation in Australia, asking her to address a public meeting when she comes to the Dominion. Interviewed in Sydney recently, she said that the declining birth rate was one of Britain’s gravest problems. In 30 years England would be a country of middle-aged people, and the young workers would be taxed so heavily that the burden would be intolerable. The chairman of the Dominion Settlement Association, Mr A. Leigh Hunt, said to-day that New Zealand was faced with a similarly grave problem. This was shown clearly by statistics. In 1878 the legitimate births were 221.3 per 1000 women; in 1936, 72.1. Further, the population was rapidly ageing. In 1942 nearly one-third of the total female population were over the age of 45, compared with less than one-tenth- in 1881. The association. Mr Hunt said, endorsed the suggestion by Dr Summerskill that one way of combating the present trend was by improving the status and economic independence of women in the home. The mother should be honoured as a patriot and given the greatest possible assistance in recognition of the fact that every child was an asset to the State. Family benefits should be adjusted so that the full cost of rearing children would fall on the community as a whole instead of on the individual parents.