REST HOMES.

Auckland Star, Volume LX, Issue 231, 30 September 1929, Page 6

REST HOMES.

The Bill introduced by the Government for the provision of res,t homes for the indigent aged—a measure that is in the humanitarian tradition of Liberalism —has been received with thankfulness by those in the best position to judge the need for it. Magistrates and social workers welcome such institutions as providing a home for classes that have long been a problem, persons who are too, senile or too irresponsible to look after themselves, but are not really proper subjects for gaol or mental hospital. The cost of these new homes will be considerable, but against this must be set the easing of the burden now carried by other institutions. The chief difficulties in operating the scheme will be in overlapping and classification. There will be many grades in the persons seeking admission or committed by the Courts to these homes; it will not always be easy to say which institution a man should be sent to; and suffering may be caused if different types are housed together. _ These, however, are not very serious difficulties, and the combined wisdom and experience of the Government, Hospital Boards, magistrates and social workers should evolve a very useful scheme.