HOME AFTER HOLIDAY

Evening Post, Volume CVIII, Issue 133, 2 December 1929, Page 12

HOME AFTER HOLIDAY

GERMAN WOMEN'S WORK

MRS. M'VICAR'S IMPRESSIONS

Although she went home principally on a health trip and to see her relatives in Argyllshire, Scotland, Mrs. Annie M'Vicar, well known in Wellington for her social welfare work, found time to visit .Germany, Belgium, and Holland. She returned to Wellington by the Mukura to-day, and told a "Post" reporter some of the interesting observations she had made while away.

After representing New Zealand at tho British Commonwealth League Conference in London—a three days' affair to which Miss Rothenburg (Wellington) was also a delegate—Mrs. M'Vicar went to Berlin to attend a women's gathering to mark the 25th anniversary of the founding of the suffrage movement. This lasted a fortnight; every nation was represented, all matters bearing on the welfare of the home and children and tho laws relating to tho home and women being discussed. "The German women are very forcibly against war," said Mrs. M'Vicar "They will tell you that during the Great War everything was for the soldier, and it was never known how much the women, children, and old people of Germany suffered. It won't be the fault of the German women if there is war again. There are now 33/ women members of the Eeichstag, and it is said that their expression of the women's viewpoint has meant .much to women, and some very useful legislation has been passed affecting the home life of Germany. The thirty-three are all delightful, intelligent, and fine women. You don't see soldiers in Germany now. The German women are out to restore the nation; one-time society women have taken up philanthropic work, and they encourage physical fitness and cleanly homes, among other things. They arc seeing that slums are pulled down and replaced, but what they showed me for 'slums,' although they were old houses, could hardly bo called by that name, they were so clean. Tremendous interest is taken in physical fitness, and I saw one weekly school demonstration in which 5000 children from wee toddlers to 16 and 17 years went through their exercises on a 20----acre field. The schools themselves are huge blocks of five and six stories, but they have no lifts that I could see; the children have to take themselves up. One kindergarten I saw stood in a wonderfully-equipped five-acre playground. ''

Mrs. M'Vicar said there did not seem to be a great deal of unemployment in Germany, but the system of providing food and beds for tlTose who were out of work was splendid. The Germans were a marvellously systematic people. The comfort and prosperity everywhere had impressed her very much, "and it's due to the Germans' own hard work," added Mrs. M'Vicar.

The suffrage anniversary convention had boon most efficiently managed, and a largo number of young people had beer, brought into it, and carried out all the details most effectively. The social engagements, too, had been quite as interesting as the business side of the gathering.

Mrs. M'Vicar was in Glasgow on election night. Rather contrary to her speculations, everything was most orderly. She also saw the university capping ceremony in that city, and the Assembly at Edinburgh. Wherever she went Mrs. M'Vicar made a point of inquiring into social welfare matters, but although she has formulated some ideas which she feels will be of use to her in her work in Wellington, she thinks there are very few things which New Zealand can learn from the institutions she has seen abroad. Those homes and institutions which she had visited were enormous, but in most cases the systems, although they suited requirements, were, no better than ours.