RELIEF OF UNEMPLOYMENT

Stratford Evening Post, Volume II, Issue 296, 5 July 1933, Page 6

RELIEF OF UNEMPLOYMENT

j Auckland City Council to j Raise Loan | LOANS BOARD'S VIEW 1 Press Association. —Copyright. Auckland, July 4. The Auckland City Council recently I approved of a proposal to raise £121,450 j under the legislation which enables local j bodies to raise loans for the relief of unemployment without a poll of ratepayers. At a meeting to-day to pass the necessary resolutions, the council received a letter from the chairman of the Loans

Board stating that the board's view was that a poll should be taken. Furthermore, under the present legislation no money could be borrowed after July 31 and no information was available to show that the time limit would be extended. It could not be extended until Parlia- | merit met. which was unlikely to be before July 31. Some of the proposed work has already been put in hand in anticipation of the granting of the loan. When the Local Government Loans Board's letter declining to sanction the City Council's loan proposal of £121,450 without a poll of the ratepayers was read at a special meeting of the council the Mayor, Mr. Huchison, said it had been specially desired to arrange for the money to be borrowed under the Act before July 31. The question whether the council should have put the proposal before the ratepayers had already been considered by the council,' which had decided to put the matter before the Loans Board. The decision of the council, he thought, was justified, j The council had realised that unless some such action had been decided upon employees would have to be discharged and more men v/ould be out of employment. Every member of the council wished to avoid increasing the unem- I ployment figures. Mr. Hutchison suggested that the j council should merely pass the resolu- ! tions as intended. That would enable j him to take the matter up with the act- | ing-Prime Minister with the hope that j the council would be able to have the ! legislation extended. He hoped that in the meantime the facts that the couricil j would be able to put before the board would cause the Loans Board to change its opinions. "I am astounded that the Government has adopted such an attitude," said Mr. E. J. Phelan, "particularly with this council, which has continuously attempted to help the Unemployment Board. There has been no Mayor in this city who has done more to help unemployment than the present Mayor. We have a'jeady committed ourselves to some of these items." The resolutions were then passed.