CORRESPONDENCE

Taranaki Herald, Volume LIV, Issue 13479, 19 July 1907, Page 7

CORRESPONDENCE

We are not responsible for the opinions expressed by correspondents. The writer's name, as a guarantee of good f aitk, must be emelosed in the letter.

GAMBLING.

(To the Editor.) Sir, — After a careful study of the Parliamentary debates, as set down in Hansard, I feel sure members have given us the key to the whole matter. Mr. Okey, M.H.R., for the first time :n his life, I expect, has been totting up grocers' bills, and he appears to have had an eye-opener. He expresses himself as astonished as to how housewives make ends meet on a Saturday night. I will tell that gentleman how it is done. It is by the bravest self-denial on the 'part of the long-suffering wives and mothers— an absolute treadmill of a life.^.so sordid, so helpless, with not one gleam of light. I have known women in this town who have not had the money to spare for a stamp to post a letter ;, and it seems to me that the men who toil are no better off. I never had such a respect for the bone and sinew of the colony as I have to-day, after learning the true position of the workers. It is a pity there is not a Hansard in every home. We should come to.. the real troubles of life, and there would not be time for fads. Sir, I have, *>f 'ten wondered where the charm of gambling came in; now I see. If mcii and women have to grind on year after year on a bare pittance, I don't wojader they try to get a few pounds or.eVen a few shillings to call their own. It*e very easy for those who sit in comfoH to judge their neighbours. I have been through the mill ever since I came to New -Plymouth,- and itris only those who have to make sixpence do a shilling's worth of work who understand the situation. I sadly fear the cry of "Teace, peace, this is God's own country" is a hollow mockery to a great many people who are deserving of our deepest sympathy. I see the Government have altered the tariff. Well, what better off will the people here be if the Government won't reduce the price of carrying goods from the breakwater? The tradespeople won't pay it, so, as usual, the poor, meek, longsuffering public will have to foot the bill. Oh, for the good old days when we carted all our stores in our own bullock drays, the days when there was not such a display of red tape. All the laws in the world won't stop gambling, while men and women have no hope of betterment. Give a man a chance to own a two-roomed shanty, and he at. once takes an interest in life. Just at present we arc* passing every penny we get to the landlord and the tradespeople. — I am, <fee., SPEARGRASS.