MUST BE PREPARED.

Star (Christchurch), Volume LXVI, Issue 20202, 12 January 1934, Page 9

MUST BE PREPARED.

Posts for Women in Public Service. OUTSTANDING EUROPEANS. It is a poor plea to ask that a woman be appointed to a position of importance simply because she is a woman, believes Miss Winnifred Kydd, president of the National Council of Women of Canada. Such a request, she told members of a Montreal Women’s Club, should be made only if the woman’s mental qualifications were equal to those of men candidates. She urged that efforts be made to encourage young women to fit themselves for special branches of public service, not necessarily political life—and then to unite to see that such positions were made available to them. Women in some of the European countries are showing marvellous leadership, and she felt it was good for a young country to know vf wffiat was being; done by people in older countries. In giving brief sketches of the personality and work of several outstanding European women who have not visited Canada and whom she met when attending the Disarmament Conference at Geneva and at the executive meeting of the International Council of Women, Miss Kydd referred to Madame Avril de Ste. Croix of France, whose efforts are directed against the white slave traffic and on behalf of women who are social outcasts. Madame Ste. Croix was described as diplomatic, calm and unruffled, and giving the impression of great sincerity. Princess Alexandra Cantacuzene, president of the National Council of Women of Rumania, a woman of unlimited energy, was the organiser of the Business and Professional Women’s Club in Rumania, and is active in the movement for disarmament. Madame Plamenkova, one of the outstanding suffragists of Czechoslovakia, is doing much to encourage the handicrafts and native arts of her country. Miss Hcnni Forchhammer has been a delegate from Denmark to the League of Nations Assembly every year since 1921. Miss Hesselgren was the first woman senator in Sweden, and is chief factory inspector in that epuntrv. Mrs Ogilvie Gordon was cited in re-1 futation of the charge Miss Kydd said she had heard in Europe that Englishspeaking women did not exert themselves to secure a number of university degrees. Mrs Gordon, D.Sc., PhD., and holder of other degrees from various universities and scientific bodies, is a geologist of note, and . Justice of the Peace, while her social work is at present directed to employment bureaus for young people in Scotland.