RELIEVING DISTRESS

Taranaki Daily News, 17 October 1931, Page 5

RELIEVING DISTRESS

WORKING OF WOMEN’S PLAN OPERATION - OP POUND SUH NEW PLYMOUTH ORGANISATION. In a room at the old Soldiers’ Club, New Plymouth, on a Friday afternoon there are three long wooden benches stacked with the necessities for living. Kerosene boxes lie about the floor tilled with a mixed assortment of goods. Six women are busily engaged in taking the parcels out of the boxes, labelling them and classifying them on the shelves. In the evening other women come down and make the goods into rations, and by Saturday, 25 lamilies in the New Plymouth district in necessitous circumstances will have received some assistance to keep them during the week. - The work is carried out by the National Council of Women under the recently inaugurated “pound’/ scheme, worked through - the schools. On the average the council has received between 400 and oOOlb of: necessities each Friday for distribution. Yesterday it received over tSOOIb, but that, included special gifts of a 751 b bag of flour. and a 501 b bag of sugar. ■ ■ The gifts are sent, by householders by tfle children to the schools each Friday morning in parcels of. a pound or more. The teachers of each school make a list of the goods received and pack them, in boxes. The carriers collect the boxes and bring them to the old Soldiers’ Club rooms. Each Friday .six members of the National Council of Women,, an organisation made up of idelegates .from each women’s organisation in the town, come to the rooms, unpack the boxes, weigh and label the goods, place them on the shelves and make a summary of the contents of the boxesThe totals of all the goods from each school are checked and entered on a card. AU the schools in New Plymouth assist in the scheme —£he Boys’ High School, Girls’ High School, Central, Town Convent, Heidelburg Convent, Fitzroy Convent, Vogeltowu, Westown, Courtenay Street Infants’ School, Moturoa, Fitzroy and West End. A list, is .prepared of , the goods, in hand: Bread, so many pounds; butter, so many; oatmeal, so many.; Besides this list there is another list prepared by the different relief societies’ nurses, showing the rations desired for different kinds of families. Ration 1 is the ration for families with one to two children, ration 2 is for families with three to five children, ration 3 is for families with six to nine children,, and there is a special ration for sick people. The average ration, ration 2, consists, for instance, of 41b flour, 141 b potatoes, 21b onions, 21b rice, 21b sago, 11b salt, 41b oatmeal, 41b sugar, ,21b butter, 11b tea 21b sultanas, 11b split peas, -Jib cocoa, lib prunes and >llb pearl barley. . The . nurses then order so. many of ration number 1, so many of ration number 2 and so many of ration number 3. The relief is "given mainly. when the man of the house is out of work. "The idea is not to keep these families,” said Miss E. Andrews, president of the council, “but just to help them to carry on. The nurses give us orders for so many of each ration but we would be unable to fill all the orders with full rations. We have to average our supply and make cuts in each ration to fulfil all the orders.

“Foi - instance, last week we were not able nearly to-give the desired quanti- f ties in ration 2. We could give ration 2 no potatoes, no onions, only 21b instead of 41b of flour, only |lb salt, 11b instead of 41b of oatmeal,- 31b instead of 41b of sugar, no prunes, no butter, lib of sultanas instead of 21b, 41b instead of 11b of tea, no cocoa, and instead of 11b split peas and ,11b barley they could have one or the other- - We have to regulate the rations according to the supply. However, the supply is steadily increasing and there is more on the shelves to-day than ever before.” When the quantities of the rations' had been averaged, said Miss Andrews; primary school women teachers came on Friday evening and made up the rations, packing them in bags for the relief, societies. On Saturday the Plunket nurse, the district nurse, the Belief Society nurse and the Salvation Army delivered the rations to the various families. Finally the boxes were collected and taken back to the schools by Mrs. Brewster and Miss-Dempster., “We keep a card index of the names of the families assisted” said Miss Andrews, "so there-is no chance of anyone r&ceiving .assistance . from two societies. All sorts of • goods are received. Recently a New Plymouth firm sent us a large, num her of tins of jam, and last week .the Girl Citizens sent us parcels. This week the ladies’ guild at Te Henui church sent us vegetables and things left over from their produce's tall. Here on our list is ham, macaroni and even frocks. It is all useful; so far we have tluown nothing away.”