MAGISTRATE SURPRISED

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 76, Issue 286, 4 December 1933, Page 11

MAGISTRATE SURPRISED

"PUBLIC MONEY WASTED." LITTLE GIRL’S MAINTENANCE “There has been a wicked waste of public money in this case,” remarked the Marylcbone magistrate when he was informed that a child of live had cost tho ratepayers £7O in less than 11 months. Before tho court was tho father of tho child, Thomas Smith, aged 34, labourer, of Yarrow, Durham, who : was charged on a warrant with running away and leaving tho little girl charge- ■ able to the London County Council, i

since last November. It was explained that the child was' costing £1 15s Id a week. Tho Magistrate: £1 15s Id a week for a child of five? Mr. Powell, the relieving officer, explained that the child was being kept in a residential school. The Magistrate: Why do they spend public money like that? Think of it. If it was my own child would it cost more, and I don’t pretend to bo a pauper, although I am not a rich man. “ Unless you give mo some explanation it seems perfectly ridiculous, and I hope a the public will know what, is being li spent. 0 When asked by tho magistrate if she t< would have spent the same amount of money on the child the mother replied, p

“I don’t suppose so.” The Magistrate: No wonder the rates are what they are, when money is spent like this. It is useless arresting this out-of-work man and bringing him buck to London. Smith was sentenced to 21 days’ iniprisonment with hard labour