WOMEN IN PUBLIC LIFE

Dominion, Volume 14, Issue 95, 15 January 1921, Page 5

WOMEN IN PUBLIC LIFE

CHANCE FOR ECONOMY. In numerous directions there is an incisive demand for economy in the expenditure public money, and much publicity has been given to the wellweighed opinions as to the saving capacity of women, expressed by prominent business men (states a London writer, under date November 16). At a conference of the Metropolitan Asylums Board, convened by the Women’s Local Government Society, the tenor wets: Fill your local councils with women members—let them inspect*and examine and retrench and contrive to their hearts’ content—then you will have real economy at last I Sir W.'H. Dickinson emphatically declared that 479 women on 978 councils were not enough—there should be at least one on every council. men as a general rule, I believe, are more economical than mon, and they aro able to practice economy." “I am one of those,” said Sir William Glyn-Joncs, in an address on the subject of economy, “who believe that there is not half enough 'contrivance’ in local government. The mail who turns his own overcoat serves on the council where the matter arises of a new uniform for the hall porter. Nobody says, ‘Let’s look at it’—the clerk has initialled tho account as one of the usual items and away it goes. I believe that a woman, inexperienced in local government, could effect immediate economies. I shudder gometimes nt the .way in which details ,of great expenditure are discussed in a small committee, where there is alg-ays a difficulty in forming a quorum, and even greater difficulty in holding it together. Very often a thing is decided by two or three people." “Women make better ‘Nosey Parkers,’ ” averred Miss Smeo (chairman of the Acton Urban District Council), "and it is their duty to adopt such an attitude, and to inspect as much ns pos. sible." All men councillors were agreed that women could be useful on some committees, that they could be tolerated on others, but that they were of no use on the remainder. Consequently, it was always difficult to get on to public health, highways, contract, works, and similar committees.