PINCH OF HARD TIMES

Dominion, Volume 14, Issue 277, 17 August 1921, Page 5

PINCH OF HARD TIMES

FELT BY SOLDIER FARMERS " • ROAD WORK SUGGESTED ’ DISCUSSION BY WAR RELIEF ADVISORY BOARD A discussion occurred at yesterday’s meeting of the Advisory Board of the War Belief Societies regarding what form of assistance should be provided for returned soldier-farmers who ware feeling tho pinch of hard times. The question was introduced by Mr. Hope Gib bons (Wanganui), whose comment upon the stops taken by the Government was that it would be better to give the soldiers work than to offer them a means of increasing their indebtedness through further loans. Mr. Gibbons explained that he was speaking of men in the backblocks, mou who were willing to work upon roads. Road work was wanted and should bo done. Xt was not tho affair of tho land boards but of tho Public Works Department. Tho men wished to work and be paid for it, instead of having their rents remitted and receiving further loans to enable them to buy the necessaries of life. ■ , He proposed \a motion asking the Minister of Public Works to give nt turned soldier-settlers work in place of adding to their loans. Tho motion asked particularly that road work adjacent to the soldiers’ holdings should bo provided. Mr. W. Power (Taranaki) said that in the backblocks of Taranaki the returned soldier-settlers, who had gone in chiefly for sheep-farming, had been hit very badly. Grants for the making of roads had been authorised for a considerable 1 time, and repeated representations bail been made with the object of -getting the grants expended and allowing the soldiers to carry out tho work. A delegate: Is there no work for them to do on the farms ? Mr. Gibbons said he could assure the meeting that the position the backblocks men was in was very bad. They could not pay interest or rent, and if the stere did not give them credit they could not get provisions. With regard to the question whether there was not work for them to do on their farms, he could only ask what use to them was work that did not bring them any return. Mr. V. J. Larner (Auckland): They have time to spaje to go and do outside work? Mr. Gibbons: Yes. Mr. Larner: Well, they ought to have their photographs taken. Mr. E. R. Grace (Otago) said that if it suited tho .men financially to go out and work he was very much in fi vour of giving them, work to do. In Otago men had walked off their sections because there was nothing coming in. If Mr, Gibbons’s proposal would eave the men in tho North Island he was in favour of it. Mr. R. J. F. Aldrich (Wellington) did not think that tho meeting would do any harm by passing Mr. Gibbons's motion. Tho man on the land was the best judge of whether he could go and do outside work or not.

„ In the cduiee of further debate it appeared that there. was considerable difference of opinion among tho delegates regarding the merits of Mr. Gibloons’s proposal, and Mr. Gibbons eventually withdrew his motion, not wishing to press it if it did not meet with, unanimous support.