PATRIOTIC FUNDS

Dominion, Volume 37, Issue 230, 26 June 1944, Page 4

PATRIOTIC FUNDS

Radio-Telephone Appeal Brings £74,313

SATISFACTION EXPRESSED Up to midnight on Saturday, £74,313 1/3, plus two cows, had been contributed in response to the national radio and telephone appeal for patriotic funds.

Auckland topped the list of provinces with £21,123. and at midnight contributions were still being received (here. On a population basis, Nelson, Hawkes Buy, West Coast, and Otago contributed most generously.

“It. is a very good result indeed,” said the secretary of the National Patriotic Fund Board, Mt'. G. A. Hayden. Inst night. "I cannot understand the Lust Coast figures, but I think that some of the contributions from that area must haw been included in the Hawke's Bay total.” Mr. Harden paid a tribute to voluntary workers in the telephone branch of the post offices throughout the Dominion and those in broadcasting studios, who, he said, bad remained at their posts till donations ceased coming in. ■ The appeal was opened at 6.45 p.m. hy the Governor-General, Sir Cyril Newall, and messages from Lieutenant-General Sir Bernard Freyberg, V.C., and other service leaders were also broadcast commending the New Zealand patriotic organization. , „ As chairman of the National Patriotic Fund Board, his Excellency explained the working of the board and the eleven pro-, viucial patriotic councils, and the delegation by the board of certain activities to organizations such as the Y.M.C.A., Salvation Army, Church Army, and others particularly fitted to carry out that work. With the exception of the food parcels for the prisoners of war, the cost of which was borne by the Government, the funds used by these organizations or agents of the board for their war work, he said, were provided from the response of the people to the patriotic all-purposes appeals, and not from any other source. “The men who are served from patriotic funds,” continued his Excellency, “have for nearly five years been standing between us and the enemy during the darkest days in our history. The picture is now changing, and the horizon grows steadily more bright. Our men overseas, however, have to carry on to the bitter end, and I am sure the people of New Zealand stand behind them in this the fifth year of the war. Men from New Zealand are scattered throughout the world, undertaking dangerous work, and a very considerable organization is necessary "to ensure, so far as is possible, that contact is maintained with them from time to time. This work could not be carried out by small individual societies because of its complexity. As chairman of the board, I am pleased to say that the great majority of our men receive from the funds not only the benefits of the organizations I have mentioned, but also sports gear, bands, concert parties, parcels, wireless sets,, cinematographs, woollen goods, and so forth, as well as having clubs and ice cream plants established for their use.” In commending the telephone appeal to the patriotism and generosity of the people, his Excellency added that the patriotic work could not go on without the support of every man, woman, and child in the Dominion. Provincial totals, to midnight, were: — £

Auckland Otago .... 21,123 .... 13.702 Wellington ... • 8,541 Oantarbnrv ... .... 8.011 Hawke’s Bay Nelson Taranaki ...... .... 0,881 .... 5,602 .... 3,780 Southland ...., .... 3,208 West Coast ...... .... 1.597 Marlborough .... .... 1.071 East Coast 703