AUSTRALIA'S DISTANCES

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume LIII, Issue 16375, 24 June 1927, Page 2

AUSTRALIA'S DISTANCES

STRIKING EXAMPLE. WOMAN'S APPLICATION FORM TRAVELLING FOR, 3 MONTHS. Sl'DNEi', June 7. Ounug a Country party conference in SvSnev, Mr. Hunter, a member of the House' of Kepresentatives for a vast Queensland electorate, told a story which provides a striking example ot Australia's vast resources. Mr. Hunter said that he had once received a letter from one of his constituents, who complained that an application he had made:, for the maternity bonus had been refused because the application had not been -received within the stipulated time of three months from the date of the baby's birth. In the cities, an applicant for this bonus of £5 receives the money within a few davs of the application being lodged. in the case mentioned by Mr. Hunter the wife of the writer ot the letter had given birth to a child, having been attended by a travelling black gin. An application form had to be obtained by sending a letter lrom their home in the far west of Queensland to a township in South Australia, and thence by way oft Adelaide, Melbourne, Sydney, and Brisbane, to Thargomindah, where the nearest police station was situated There was no means of getting the letter direct to Thargomindah. After the form was received from Thargomindah, via Brisbane, Sydney, Melbourne, Adelaide, and the South Australian township, it had to be returned, filled in, to Thargomindah by the same round-about route. But. there was an error in the application form, and it had to be returned to the applicant. Again it was carried over thousands of miles to the sender. In the meantime the black gin who had attended the settler's wife, and who was required to witness the document, had gone on, and it took weeks to find her. When the corrected application again reached Thargomindah four months had elapsed since the birth of the baby, and the Cbnunissioners responsible for the disbursement of the bonus were compelled to refuse payment, owing to the lodging time having been exceeded. "But Mr. Hunter was able to give a happy ending to his little story. When he placed before the authorities his account of the difficulties of communication, the Treasury made a special grant of £5 to the disappointed applicant.