The Pahiatua Herald. PUBLISHED EVERY EVENING WEDNESDAY, JULY 18, 1928. ADVANCED SOCIAL LEGISLATION.

Pahiatua Herald, Volume XXXVI, Issue 10890, 18 July 1928, Page 4

The Pahiatua Herald. PUBLISHED EVERY EVENING WEDNESDAY, JULY 18, 1928. ADVANCED SOCIAL LEGISLATION.

The Minister of Public Health is to be complimented upon the Bill dealing with the Unfits of Society which was read a first time in the House of Representatives yesterday. The Bill is long overdue, and is the outcome of the recommendations of the 1924 Commission—-probably the most important ever held in this country—and the report and suggestions of Dr. T. G. Gray, Inspector-General of Mental Hospitals. The Government has been criticised in the past for the delay that has occurred in connection with the problem, but it will be seen that it is proposed to handle the subject in a comprehensive and humane manner. A Board is to be established, with necessarily wide powers, and a register is also to be kept of the names of all mentally defective persons resident in the country. The marriage of these unfit persons is rightly enough to be forbidden, and the duty of registrars of marriages in future will be clearly to refuse certificates to the undesirables who come under the ban. There is also provision for sterilisation. The Bill is an advanced stage in social legislation, and will be welcomed by all reformers and those engaged in humanitarian work.