WOMEN IN CAMPS

Taranaki Daily News, 19 February 1931, Page 6

WOMEN IN CAMPS

PLEA FOR REMOVAL,

PUBLIC WORKS MEN’S WIVES.

An appeal for the women and children in the public works camps whose husbands, discharged from the railway works, have been removed to othei’ parts of the Dominion, was made at Gisborne on Saturday by Mr. J. B. Williams, organising secretary for the New Zealand Workers’ Union, and Mr. F. Milroy, secretary for the union at Gisborne. “The position was bad enough before the earthquake, but. it is very much worse now,” sqid Mr. Wililams. “These women, with their husbands away, are in a very nervous state, and some are in a delicate state of health. They have felt the earthquake shocks very severely and are afraid to go to bed sit night. “Most of the women who were in the valleys have been brought out. Some are at Kopua, some at Bartlett s and others at Wharakekaha. One camp is on the edge of a high cliff overlooking the sea, where the earthquakes have been terrifying. We are all concerned in getting these women taken to their husbands. In times of emergency such as this a woman looks for the moral support of her husband, and these women are entitled to that.

-‘Even under present conditions a man

cannot earn enough to support, two homes, and I am very sure that if the people only knew the condition, under which the women are living there would be an outburst of public sympathy on their behalf, and the public would jom with us in forcing the Government to do something.” . ,