BURIED TOOLS.

Star (Christchurch), Volume XLIV, Issue 744, 24 April 1933, Page 7

BURIED TOOLS.

“ The New Minister is a Gentleman.”

MR SCARFF’S COMMENT

It tv as stated at a meeting of the Citizens’ Unemployment Relief Committee this morning by the chairman (Mr E. H. Andrews) that the tools recently dug up in the yard of the old Public Works store in St Asaph Street had been given to the committee and were being reconditioned for use on the Summit Road.

In reporting on an interview with the newly-appointed Minister of Public Works (the Hon John Bitchener), Mr W. W. Scarff said: “I might say the new Minister is quite a gentleman.” Above the laughter greeting this remark, Mr J. W. Beanland was heard to comment: ‘‘Mr Scarff does not mean the others were not.” Mr Scarff waited for the laughter to die down and then declared that he did not see what there was to laugh at. Mr Scarff said he had seen the Minister when returning from Wellington on the boat. He had asked the Minister for the right to prospect for further tools. “A reply was promised for Wednesday morning, and it arrived to the hour,” Mr Scarff added. “If the gentleman who organised the first search were to organise this one with the assistance of a gentleman across the table, I feel sure we would have some success. It might be worth sending a prospecting party to Parnassus.” The report was received.