THE WAIFS AND STRAYS OF SOCIETY.

Otago Witness, Volume 30, Issue 2353, 30 March 1899, Page 61

THE WAIFS AND STRAYS OF SOCIETY.

THEIR TREATMENT IN SOUTH AUSTRALIA.

INTERVIEW WITH A VISITOR TO DUNEDIN.

At a time when the public attention is being attracted to tho question of the. treatment of society's juvenile waifs and strays — the criminal and the neglected young, — it is advantageous that the experience of other places should be noted in order that, if possible, a lesson may be derived from it. Miss Howard, of Adelaide, a lady who has taken a warm interest in this subject and has been prominently connected, as a. member of the " State Children's Council" in her own colony, being in Dunedin at the present time, therefore, an interview was sought with her, and sho readily agreed to afford the readers of the Daily Times what information it was in her power to impart. The State Children's Council, it should be explained, is a body that is colonial in its character, iU sphere of labour embracing the whole of South Australia. The committee consists? of six ladies and six gentlemen, one of the latter being president, and the council employs a &ecrct(iry and a large staff. The appointment of members of the committee is made by the Government, but appointments may bo recommended by members of the council. The council is a very representative one 'n respect of the rel'.gipus beliefs of its .members. Anglican*. Roman Catholics, and Nonconformists are all represented on it.

• " Our reformatory and industrial school were until quite lately," Miss Howard staled, " under one roof, in a very large institution, at .Magill, which is about five miles from Adelaide. Tl is a most lovely place and there is a farm in connection with it. Formerly there was a training ship, but it was considered ihat agricultural pursuits were better for boys who were inclined to be wild than a life in port was*. It was felt that the influence surrounding them in port was bad, and that they were harder to look after there."

The experience at Sydney on tho training ship Sobraou, it was pointed out to Miss Howard, did not support this view. '"Wo considered as a whole," Miss Howard replied, " after a good deal of experience, that agricultural pursuits were better for boys of that class."

How long was the ship in exibleuce?

" I believe for many years. Another reason why we got rid of it was that tho f-hip wan getting rather rotten, and a good deal of tho boyfs' time was employed in pumping out. That was, however, not the chief reason. We preferred to have agricultural pursuits for boys of that class. About the ramo Mine the reformatory girls were removed to a special establishment at Goodwood, which is about five miles from Adelaide, in the opposite direction from MaBill. The buildingd us Goodwood are divided into three cottages, which nre called 'Faith,' 'Hope,' and 'Charity.' Phe \ery worst of the girls are kept entirely in one cotti'ge with a matron of their own, and a - wardswoman of their own. The inmates are under the supervision^ of the general matron, but, these girls never come to her cottage, but are kept entirely in their own while they are 'on their probation. If after a certain trme 'they have improved Fuffieiently to be brought into contact with other girls, they are removed to the second cottage, which contains chiefly girls who have come from the first ; and in process of time they may be removed to the matron's cottage, where they wail on her and do the necessary work. When the members of tho committee visit -the reformatory these girls wait on them. I do not f>ay that those girls are absolutely saved after they have passed through the second or even the third cottage, but we find it a most efficient plan to keep the elaF?es quite distinct." The girls would not invariably begin at tho third cottage? "Some of them might go to the second cottage at first, and some might go into the first one, but generally they have to work up from the third to the first, and we have had home very sad case". Each cottage has its own matron. There is a large laundry in connection with the reformatory at Goodwood, and all the laundry work of tho boys' reformatory comes there for the girls to do. On Iho other hand, all the legelables and fruit conMimed at the girls' reformatory are grown at Magill by the boy*. The girls from the reformatory go out to general -service, but no girl is allowed to enter service without having served under the matron and without having had more or less liberty within tho precincts of the reformatory. The matron is a very kind'hearted woman, and she takes the girls to meetings and so on."

Are the boys classified in tho same way as the girls? " I believe there is precisely the same kind of classification at Magill. They have a large number of cows on their farm there, and they make all the butter that is used at Goodwood. They are taught gardening, too, and they have a carpentry master. In fact, they are taught everything useful and enjoy life very much, through having their time fully occupied in this way. There is a first-clabs schoolmaster. They have prayers .'egularly, and any clergyman belonging to any denomination has fruo accc-. to the institution. The children all go on Suudaj to the religious hervicsi of their

own denomination, under the supervision oJ members of the staff." ""- What you have said relates only to the reformatories? " The industrial school contains children; who have not been convicted of crime. The girls in the industrial school have now "been removed to the cottages at Goodwood, and the girls of the reformatory class have now gone up country — not because the Goodwood institutions did not answer, but because it w«s wished to get the industrial school children away from the atmosphere of the boys' reformatory. Now the industrial school is removed to Goodwood. The children are nearly all small and have to be boarded out. Besides all this the Roman Catholics have a school, which is taken care of by a very good priest, and a very large number of Roman Catholic children go there, but not all. This school, I ought to say, is more or less under the control of the S.C.C.j»'Who, with the secretary, make periodical visits there."

Are children committed to these institutions from the Police Court?

" At one time the children used to go before Iho Police Court in Adelaide and be tried there. Now we hold a court in qur own office. They very often come to us from the police, but we have our own little court in our own office, a magistrate presiding over it. Not even criminal ' children ' go to the Police Court and never to gaoL Possibly, however, a child in the country Wo have had nothing to do with may be committed for a crime and be sent to gaol."

Supposing n, small- boy in the town to bo arrested for theft, what would happen to him! "The police would take him to our sctfr*tary and he would be committed by a magi>trato under our own roof. We consider thaV to send a boy to gaol is the very wor?t thing that could happen to him. The punishment if it is a whipping, is administered by one of our inspectors, and if a boy has to go to the reformatory for punishment the magistrate commits him for as long as he thinks right." Does the council select the foster-homes for the industrial school children?

" No child is boarded out without the permission of the council. Foster-parents in all parts of tho colony send applications for children. The applications are brought before the council. and investigations are made as to the character of the people and the nature of the home. We never stick out for a home being over-and-above comfortr.ble. We wish the children to see the rough side of life, and take their share of the burden of the home. So long as people are honest and will train the children and give them sufficient, we do not object to them bcause they are poor. The visitors go about once a month to tee the children and look after their clothes. Every district'ha 1 ? its local committee, and if any complaints have to be made about tho children they are made lo the local committee, who communicator with the secretary. The Stato schoolmaster at^o sends a report as well. Wo f.re very strict about the children attending school regularly. All that sort of tiling haa lo bo put down in the master's report. ~tVc go to no end of trouble with the children. Many of them come to us with hereditary weaknesses, and the State doctor looka alter them, and many little operations — on their eyes, ears, and so on — are performed on "them to cure them of these weaknesses."

Have you had many cases oi failures with the children?

" Thero have been comparatively few caEes of failures. Sometimes a child runs away,moslly for the sake of change. If a child leaves hie home the police are informed, and when he is found he is taken straight to the secretary, and the council will probably change the home, «nd if he has done anything very wrong he ip sent to the reformatory. We haA'e two inspectors who occasionally go — perhaps thi'eo or four times a year — to the loster-homes. We never allow any of the foster-parents to tako any lodgers. They must ha\ c no one but their own family. The children are expected to share in all Iho burdens of tho home, and in fact to take the place of members of tho family. Some of the worst cases have turned out the very best. At one time- I sent to tho reformatory for a boy. He had beon committed for a terrible crime, but we did not know that. Ido not think we would have dared to take him if we had known. He left us and went back to the reformatory, but eventually he was sent to a home in the country. He has been there for three or four years, and they would not part with him for anything. That is only one of many cases. A great many of tho girls are very well married. The husband always knows everything before he marries her. There have been very happy marriages. The girls come back to the institution sometimes with their children and stay for v. day or two, so that they do not look upon it <v.i a stigma to have been kept there."

Has it been your experience that among the merely destitute there have been children as eviLclispoeed as among the criminal? '^Ye would not get hold of them if they had been well trained. You cannot expect them to be perfect type?, and some of them — it is hereditary, I suppose — ?iye a good deal of trouble. There are children who go to service when they are old enoughj aud still give trouble. They came to us with very disagreeable tendencies. Here, in New Zealand, children of this class mix with tho criminal class. They are the very typo to be most easily corrupted." Is there a system of transfer from the ono institution to the other?

"Transfers arc made from the industrial school to the reformatory. If a child commits a crime in the industrial school or runs away he may be sent to the reformatory. That is his punishment." Miss Howard, not having the particulars with her, was unable to speak definitely on the subject of the cost of the South Australian system, excepting on the point of the paj'ineiilft to foster-parents. "We only pay 5s a week for boarding-out children," f>he said, '" except when they are very young or delicate, and then we pay 10c Our boarding-out system is as successful as in any part of the world, and many of- the cases of children being boarded-out end in their being adopted." Miss Howard admits the costliness or the plan adopted th. South Australia, but the maintains that it is short-sightedness not to see that money is well spent which saves the young fronv becoming criminals. Miss Howard mentioned that she had visited the Industrial School at Caversham, and she was very much pleased with everything that met the eye. " With the material Mr Burlineon has to work with," she said, "he oould not do better. The place is scrupulously clean and in perfect order."

The Wanganui Herald plates that Mr Remington declines to stand down for Mr Wilki6 at the electidn for Patea seat.

A hundred women clerkships at the London General Po»l Office will be offered for competition at the forthcoming examination. This is tho larges-l accession i" recent yeai«. and will L-riiiK tho number of \vo;noii employed at tho General Post Office alone up to 1500,