WELLINGTON TOPICS

Wanganui Herald, Volume LIII, Issue 15863, 7 July 1919, Page 5

WELLINGTON TOPICS

THE SOLDIER AND THE LAND RPELIMINARY TRAINING. “—* , * (From our Special Correspondent.) WELLINGTON, July 5. The Minister of Lands and his colleagues have good reason to be disap- V pointed by the fery poor sustesp that has attended their efforts to indue© returned soldiers to enter upon < a - course of training iff*rural pursuits preparatory to taking up land on their own account. How poor this success has been may be judged from a letter / addressed by the Hon. D. ,H. Guthrie to a leading business man in WellingHon, who, unaware of what the Government was doing .in this direction, * had urged the Minister to set aside suitable blocks of land on which soldiers might be employed and obtain some rudimentary knowledge of agricultural operations. The fact that - * this gentleman didL not .know of the Government’s efforts may suggest, one reason why they have not been more successful. SCHOOL AND NO PUPILSThe soldiers themselves, however, have had particulars of these training, farms placed before them> again .and again, and their failure Co respond in much greater numbers to the Minister’s invitation is simply inexplicable. “Some, areas already have been set apart for training on the lines suggested by you,” Mr Guthrie explains to his correspondent, ‘’and it is intended to operate them when the soldiers show the inclination to submit to the training., So far, however, the response has not been sufficient to warrant putting the work in hand. I may say, also, that one estate in Canterbury was offered to the Patriotic Society, 'which advertised for soldiers to train but could not get them.” The Minister’s correspondent thicks this an astounding state of affairs, and is anxious to know what the returned soldiers have to say about the matter. • COST OP LIVING. A table pulisbed by the Dominion comparing the retail prices of August, 1906, with those of July, 1919, has set people talking again of the cost of living in terms by no means complimentary to the .authorities whd are supposed to control' such matters. Bread during the interval of thirteen years has advanced from 3d to 5d ner 2lb loaf, jam from 4d to 6fd per lb, oatmeal frpm Is to 2s 7|d per 71b bag, kerosene from4s \ to 9s, per tin, bacon from s|d 1 6 Is'ld per lb (the cheapest cuts), coal- from 7s 6d to 15s per quarter ton, fish from - 2d to 6d, Bd, and Is per lb, and mhny , other articles of daily use in the same proportion. There is , a growing feeling among the public, as the shoe pinches harder, that the Government is largely responsible for thejd' increases, and that the Board of Trade has utterly failed to alleviate the position.

MINING AND MINERS. The Coal' Mine Owners' Association concluded its sitting here without making any of its major conclusions public. - It has agreed to meet the representatives of the Coal Miners’ Federation, after the individual companies have had sufficient opportunity to consider the effect of the demands made by the men, and it'has suggested that the conference between the parties should be open iaf the Press. While waiting for further developments public opinion certainly i* inclining more to the owners’ side than it has done before. The men’s demands that only one shift shall be worked during the twenty-four hours and that ,no shift shall work longer than seven hours, bank to bank, are not of a kind to find favour with a community in the throes of a coal famine. The owners, on the other hand, are showing, a pweet spiritof reasonableness which has gone far to win for them the sympathy of thv “crowd.” - ‘ ;