“WRONG IN PRINCIPLE”

Taranaki Daily News, 24 January 1933, Page 6

“WRONG IN PRINCIPLE”

TENDERS CALLED FOR WORK.

OLD PEOPLE’S HOME PAINTING.

While it was agreed that twelve bedrooms at the Rangiatea Old Peoples Home were in need of paint, members of the Taranaki Hospital Board were not altogether in agreement upon the question of how the work should be done when the matter came before the board yesterday. After some discussion and the defeat of an amendment, the recommendation of the house and finance committee that tenders should be called for labour only was adopted. The engineer will supervise the' work and decide which rooms are to be painted. Mr. J. Gibbs said a number of the rooms required attention as they were in a disgraceful condition. Mr. .J. Brown asked why tenders should be called when there were unemployed men capable of doing the work. The opinion that such a policy as the one suggested by Mr. Brown would merely perpetuate unemployment was the opinion of Mr. S. Vickers. The calling of tenders would creat work of a kind that was required to incorporate unemployed men. Mr. Gibbs said it had to be remembered that the old people whose rooms would be chosen as in need of renovation would have to shift out while the work was in progress. For that reason an essential point of the job was speed. He understood that unemployed men received only a certain number of days a week which might mean that the work would drag on for some time. Mr. J. Young moved and Mr. Brown seconded an amendment that unemployed labour should be utilised. It was not right in principle that unemployed men should be paid relief rates for working at their own trade, said Mr. H. E. Blyde. . Mr Brown indicated that men workmg on relief preferred to be employed in their own trades if possible. The amendment was put and lost.