CHURCH AND LABOUR.

Waikato Times, Volume 90, Issue 14027, 2 April 1919, Page 2

CHURCH AND LABOUR.

(To the Editor.) Kir,—lt- has been truly said that ipnorance is the greatest enemy with wm n the working class movement has to contend, but how great that enemy is can be appreciated - only by those who have given the subject attention. In England, out of 2,750,000 boys and fir.'s betwe?n 12 and 16, nearly .100,000 get no further education after the age of 13; of the remaining 1,65u*,°00j the majority ar e educated for a very short time; only 250,000 go 'to proper secondary schools. Between 16 and 25 there are in. England and Wales 5,850,000 young persons, roughly. Of these, 5,350,000 get no education at all at that age, 93,000 only have a foil time course, and 390,000 have part education at evenschools, Just fancy merry England, out of nearly 6,000,000 of her youth, her coming generation, only c. 90.000 get a part-time education. In New Zealand there were 21,000 chil- - Standard 11. Of this number, 1000 would not reach Standard 111., •i 00 would never reach Standard IV., 3000 would fea.ve before entering Standard V., and 5000 would never reach Standard VI. All of these children left school before the age of 14 years. Just think! Out of 21,000, 11,000 children of the working class never reached Standard Vl—ll.ooo young minds and brains starved and. s ~t -ted Victims to ignorance, future cl ives to mines and factory. These are * made by Mr J. Caughley, Director of Education in' New Zealand in 1915. Thanks to Labour _ and the workers' educational association, they have managed to get a great deal of this s ">pped lately- And what has the Ohurr* done to help Labour to get these reforms, which is the backbone of the li fcion? Ther e is great talk about fficiency just now; but how can. voi' -ret efficiency from a nation which lacks education? Some little time a<ro th e Churches would not take up the no-license question ,but now there i* nrital in it, who is doing a push? It is time to get on the other fence. There are plentv of things which require a little push. We want more monev spent on education. We want to stop overcrowding in schools; we want statesmen to represent us in Parliament, not politicians; we want better railway services, and better treatment for our soldiers; we want a better land policy to help the farmers. Above all, we want a Democratic Government, which will give us the initiative and referendum, that we may have direct legislation by the people through the political machinery of the referendum, coupled with their right to initiate any question that to them seemed of importance, and based on the principle of majority rule These are the reforms which Labour is fighting for. The workers wf.nt their sons trained as doctors, whose business will be health-giving, not wr-alth-getting; trained as lawyers, whose business will be justice, not fees; tr.ev want their boys to be living tcftcne' i " rot as mechanical manipulators of child labour, inspired not with •the idea of getting on, but with the idea of social service. These are questions of Christianity which the Church should look into in their spare time, and then they would have less audacity for the Labour Partv.—l am. etcERNEST WATSON.