MUCH ACCOMPLISHED

Dominion, Volume 37, Issue 196, 17 May 1944, Page 8

MUCH ACCOMPLISHED

National Council Of Women Records Busy Year Record of a satisfactory year’s work was presented by the annual report of the Wellington branch of the National Council of Women at the annual meeting held recently.. Several new affiliations and many new associate members were reported and most gratifying of all was the fact that so many women, both through their organizations and individually, had approached the council during the year with problems which.it had been able to assist them in solving. One of the most successful, efforts of the year had been the formation of the associate members into'the Public Opinion Group, which already had the achievement of placing a woman on the local licensing committee to its credit. The subject of the N.Z. Licensing Laws and the whole question of liquor had been taken up seriously and much time and study had been given to the licensing laws and the liquor question of other countries. As a result of this investigation, the report stated, the fact emerged that New Zealand was woefully behind other countries in her treatment of the subject. Members were using the result of their investigation in framing suggestions which it was intended to place before the Royal Commission to be held before long. During the year, it had been necessary to take a stand on more than one occasion where it was felt that the rights and needs of citizens were being overlooked, members of the council supporting, with the women of other Wellington organizations. the case of Dr. Clara Lee, of the R.N.Z.A.F. Later the council bad supported the nurses in their approach to the Government with a request for difty shoes and had also made representations to the Government in regard to the shortage of nursing and domestic staffs in local private hospitals. ' For some time it had been felt that there was a need for closer co-operation between the Government on the. one hand and the consumer on the other in respect to the difficult matter of rationing and price control, as well as the other controls that had become part of the daily life of wartime. A move had been made toward this end by the suggestion of a liaison committee drawn from various women’s organizations, which the council felt would allow for intelligent co-opera-tion on the part of the public. . Officers were elected/or the coming year as follows: —President, Mrs. M. J. Forde,J.P.; secretary. Mrs. R. P. Graham; treasurer, Mrs. H. G. Chapman; executive, Mrs. R. Tait. J.P.. Miss M. England, Miss E. M. North, Miss D. Lynn. Miss Si MacKenzie and Miss E. Matson.