THIRD EDITION. IMPRESSIONS OF ENGLAND

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume LIII, Issue 16492, 9 November 1927, Page 11

THIRD EDITION. IMPRESSIONS OF ENGLAND

NOT NEARLY SO DECADENT AS DAUNTED BRIEF CHAT WITH NAPIER TOURIST. \ Doleful pictures painted by the pessimists of the future of the British Empire are contradicted by Mr. I). Annand, of Napier, who has recently returned from a six months’ tour of the Old Country. He speaks optimistically of the promise for the Empire’s future. After his tour of England and Scotland he told a Napier pressman he was convinced that all the propaganda about the decadence of the Empire and the disrupt (ion of Old .England was false. On his trip, he said, he found the greatest of optimism, brightness and gaiety everywhere. People were well dressed 1 and appeared happy, theatres were prowded, with queues waiting half a. mile long and the beaches and seaside resorts were thronged every week-end. There was unemployment, Mr. Annand admitted, but that was chiefly among the class who would never work, he said. The pernicious dole system of payment to unemployed was still in force, lie said, and doing great harm, many preferring to be on the dole rather than earn an honest living. Oh the whole, however, he found the Old Country brighter and imbubed with a spirit of optimism. He had spoken, ho said, to the editors of some of the leading journals in some of the principal cities and had found his own opinion as to the expectation of a happy and prosperous future for England confirmed by them. MORE CONTINENTAL. England, said Mr. Annand, was becoming more and more Continental and the same applied to- Scotland to a more limited extent. There was now no Sunday at Home, he said, everyone repairing to the seaside, which resorts were crowded during the season. Buses and trains absolutely packed out ran to the bathing places and to get a seat in the conveyances or to secure a room in the town* it was necessary to book days ahead. Few people went to church, lie. found, this being largely traceable to the tremendous growth of the broadcasting fever, there being a wireless set in every second house at Home. People preferred to listen to the broadcast sermons at home rather than make the journey to the church, and then also they could “ pick up ” the broadcast concerts.

Mr. Annand said that the universal existence of gambling at Home was most astounding. All classes, from the highest to the lowest, participated liberally, and there were bookmakers’ agents in the factories and even in schools, taking penny and threepenny bets from children. Hundreds and hundreds of bookmakers operated all over the country, lie said. The English people displayed the greatest enthusiasm for sport, and this was featured widely in the papers. Mr. Annand had the opportunity to witness “ tin-hare ” races. Ho described them as wildly thrilling, and he voiced the opinion that they had come to stay at Home. Fifteen thousand people attended an evening meeting he was at, lie said, and l there was the liveliest betting on the dogs. So great a knock was the “ tin-hare ” sport giving the racing clubs, he said, that the latter were considering running night races to combat their influence.— Napier Telegraph.