News in Brief

Star (Christchurch), Volume XLIV, Issue 642, 21 December 1932, Page 8

News in Brief

Back-Pay for Watersiders. The Lyttelton watersiders yesterday received a Christmas box in the form of back pay amounting to between £SOO and. £6OO. Since last August they have been working on a flat rate of Is lid per hour, btjt as the result of negotiations the employers conceded the men an extra penny an hour, and in making this payment retrospective to August paid out the amount in one sum yesterday. The payments in individual cases ranged from 2s 3d to 355. The decision of the employers affects the whole of the New Zealand waterfront. Ex-Servicemen Complain. Complaints that the Public Service Commissioner had advertised under a nom de plume positions vacant in the State Advances Department were made afr the meeting of the Christchurch branch of the Returned Soldiers’ Association last night. It was stated that the Government had promised preference to returned soldiers, but the men had not known from the advertisement the nature of the vacancies, and therefore had not applied as ex-servicemen. The meeting decided to forward a protest to association headquarters with a view to having discontinued the practice of departmental advertising under a nom de plume. Question of Memory. Some remarks concerning consciousness of what happens just before and after an accident were made by Mr Justice Frazer in delivering a judgment in the Arbitration Court yesterday afternoon. He said his experience of accident cases was that a person who suffered irfcjury was unable to remember exactly what happened at the time consciousness was wiped out. Although a person might return to the scene of the accident and sit down quietly to reconstruct the affair, the result was mainly the product of the imagination. The memory of the incidents had disappeared and could not be revived, though the person concerned might honestly believe that he had had a revival of memory. A Lenient Penalty. “ What is the use of making a man pay money to the Government when he is hard up and even had to borrow 2s 6d to enable him to come to this Court?” asked Mr J. G. L. Hewitt, S.M., in the Napier Magistrate’s Court. His remarks referred to a defendant who was convicted on a charge of making a false statement to a representative of the Unemployment Board. “ I quite appreciate your Worship’s remarks,” replied Mr E. A. Wood, the informant, '* but leniency in these cases makes it very hard to keep intact the provisions of the Unemployment Act.” The Magistrate said he did not think the case warranted imprisonment, and, as the defendant appeared to have no money, he ordered him.to come up for sentence when called upon.