Emancipation Example

Press, Volume CVI, Issue 31118, 22 July 1966, Page 2

Emancipation Example

New Zealand women could well follow the example set by the women of Japan in their rapid achievement of emancipation, the president of the Christchurch branch of the National Council of Women (Mrs M. Ashley) told the monthly meeting last evening.

On April 10, 1946, the Japanese women cast their first votes and within two years many women’s organisations had been established, she said. In 1949 Women’s Week was established by the Women and Minors’ Bureau. During the week the bureau arranged a three-day national conference to give women of various organisations an op-

portunity to meet and exchange ideas. The bureau was still the official sponsor of the annual conference. Much of its steadily growing success was because of the representatives from women’s, youth, labour, welfare and international organisations, public and private enterprise,

the press and radio and television.

The bureau, in consultation with prominent citizens, selected a specific conference theme each year. Women wishing to participate in the conference were invited to write an essay on the theme. From the thousands of essays submitted, the best 60 were chosen, said Mrs Ashley. The winning essayists were invited to attend the conference and had their expenses paid by the Government Many women’s organisations sent representatives at their own expense. For some years the conference had been televised. The telecasts had stimulated public interest and had given the women who could not attend a sense of participation. This year the theme of the conference was "Women in a Changing Society.” Its pur-, pose was to review the, achievement of the last 20 years and “to re-examine the; roles women should perform’ as home-makers, mothers, workers and citizens in active participation in all aspects of the nation's life. “It is a pleasure and a privilege to salute the women of Japan,” said Mrs Ashley. “May we all be as concerned and as eager to learn all that will be studied at our own N.C.W. conference, to be held in Dunedin in October.”