SHIRKING EMPLOYERS.

Dominion, Volume 8, Issue 2471, 26 May 1915, Page 9

SHIRKING EMPLOYERS.

A WOMAN'S OFFER TO WORK OVERTIME. (To the Editor.) Sir,—l was pleased to read your subleader this morning. Many Civil Service clerks when asked -why they have not enlisted say "the Commissioners won't allow any more men to go." Of course it is a free country, and truly patriotic men -would not let the probable loss of a position stop them coming to their country's aid, but it does seem queer that while on the one hand the call is for more and more men the Commissioners (who should be an example to other employers) should be stepping the men going. _ Banks also are stopping their men going. In one case the married men of a large banking concern in Wellington offered to ■work every night till eleven o'clock so that their single men might be relieved, but this was refused. The position goes still further, and many wholesale houses especially those dealing in produce of this country—who are making lots of money out of the war—are also stopping their men going. It is quite time the employers of large bodies of men who are not employed in making war materials made it distinctly unpleasant for men who could go and won't. I know the work of the country must- go on, but clerical work and lots of other work could be done by women. If there is a shortage of women, I for one would be only too pleased to give my evenings (I am engaged in an office all day),, and I am sure I could get hundreds of others who would be only too pleased to think they were really doing something for their country by releasing more men. It is only fair to say that all employers are not like this, for one firm of solicitors recently dismissed two clerks who could enlisc and had not done so, while a well-known drapery firm here is making things distinctly unpleasant for "shirkers," and if they don't offer their services soon they may be' compelled to do so for lack of other employment — I am, etc., A WOMAN. Wellington, May 25, 1915.