UNEMPLOYMENT AND THE LAND.

Waikato Times, Volume 113, Issue 18877, 22 February 1933, Page 9

UNEMPLOYMENT AND THE LAND.

(To the Editor.) Sir, —In recent editions of your newspaper several columns have hean devoted directly or indirectly to the above subject, and in the issue of February ID 1 was especially interested In a letter from Mr It. G. Young, of Gordonton. He remarked that the Idea of placing the unemployed on the land was nothing short of orlminal. 1 venture to suggest that his adjective has been incorrectly selected. I would rather say that the idea is foolish, and my statement is based upon the following facts: —I was informed by a certain registry ofllcc that during one week they had received 35 applications by one mail for employees of various types for all varieties of work, and their correspondence was Increasing from employers who were unable to obtain assistants. This, they said, was due to the fact that the work which was being given to those who termed •themselves “unemployed," and received unemployment benefit, was being preferred to the oilier forms of employment for which they were daily receiving applications. They added that the lure of town life was a very Important contributory factor which deterred the more willing members from launching out an to the land. Life in all its forms has always been a struggle for existence. I suggest that except in certain deserving eases this struggle is being avoided by those people, and in voting for their assistance considerable harm is being wrought. It could be more effectively invested —for after all it is an investment —if it were used for the assistance of present farmers who are undergoing exceptionally difficult times, but who, despite adversity, have the will to conquer. It cannot be denied that they have been called upon to shoulder the burden until now and then perhaps the motto of life, which they have adopted may become the moilo of these men: “Absque labore

nihil," or, as Rudyard Kipling so beautifully constructed it—- “ New Zealand Is a garden, And such gardens are not made By saying, ‘Oh, how beautiful, And sitting in the shade, While better men than we go out And start their working lives By grubbing weeds from gravel paths . ~ With broken dinner-knives. Finally, may I point out that if Mi R. C. Young was intending to draw a parallel between New Zealand unemployment and tho condition which exists in Great Britain I should liko to add that no such parallel can be drawn. The unemployment m the latter country is essentially due two causes— firstly, U» Cic fact that in nearly every tonn or employment the employees ai«restricted by their unions Hot working for any sum les ® Idu a fixed minimum wage; and, seoondtj, because of this intervention women and girls are obtaining work at low cost which previously was available for male workers. Therefore 1 cannot see what relation the unemployment in Great Britain can have to that oi this country.—l am, .etc., LUCIEN D. BLACKBURN. Riverlea, Okoroire.