SATURDAY HALF-HOLIDAY

Dominion, Volume 8, Issue 2514, 15 July 1915, Page 8

SATURDAY HALF-HOLIDAY

PBOTEST FROM SMALL SHOPKKEPEKS. I "When half the shops in AVellington or more .were closing'on Hie Wednesday afternoon there existed the option to close on the Saturday if . the shopkeepers so desired/ hut after ' a poll of. the ratepayers declared for Saturday afternoon closing that option automatically ceased, and it is now a case of close on Saturday and no other day. - On the testimony of many shopkeepers the Saturday closing has affected their business very considerably. One draper in Willis' Street states that .his weekly; receipts.have dropped-between .£6O and .£7O, aiid a Willis Street mercer in a big way confesses to a serious falling oft'. The fancy goods shops have experienced a difference on tlio wrong side. Oh tho other hand there are those who state that the change lias made little or no difference.. The small shopkeepers throughout New Zealand are . moving in tho direction of petitioning Parliament praying that the option accorded tliem for- twenty years past be retained when the vote favours Saturday or auy other, day. - ' • . Mr.-A. Moore, of Auckland, president of tho Wednesday Half-holiday Defence League, who is touring the Dominion ill connection with the matter, states that ho. has 'already received 600 signatures from Auckland sliopkeepers in all thoroughfares favouring the optional idea in lieu of tho restriction imposed by Section 17 •of the Shops and Offices Act. Ho states most' emphatically that the operation of this clause has proved an utter failure after a two-years' trial-in Auckland,: and Wellington, shopkeepers—par-ticularly-the small men—will, he says, find it so in Wellington. Ho contends that.it is unfair to allow the man in tho street to decide which day shopkeepers shall close their premises."' He (tho man lin the street) was not concerned financially, and by a lack of knowledge of each individual business cannot know anything of their inner working. The optional system; lie-argued, v;as fairer for all parties in that it permitted those who desired to close on Saturday to do so and give a corresponding liberty to those whose business interests were best served by observing the mid-week' half-day.