BELIEF WORKS

Evening Post, Volume CXVI, Issue 103, 28 October 1933, Page 5

BELIEF WORKS

REPLY TO EMPLOYERS

Tho treasurer (Mr. D. McLaughlin) of the National Union of Unemployed writes as follows regarding the annual report of the New Zealand Employers'1 Federation:—■ "Tho report concludes very wisely in so far as it disowns any suggestion that its views on unemployment :ivo conclusive. At the samo time it indicates a desire on the part of its creators to evade facing up to straightforward issues, and to leave a. handy get-away from the repercussions which are invited by the remarks which infer that relief workers generally arc physical and moral wrecks almost. "The report states: 'Anyone who has seen anything of tho relief works being carried on today in the vicinity of tho cities must realise what a ghastly farce they are,' and 'there must be some means by which these unfortunate men can (1) be trained and brought to a state of physical fitness; (2) taught liow to perform some work of use to the community.' "Do the small body of men who framed this now stereotyped form of attack upon approximately 25 per cent, of New Zealand's workers realise that this kind of generalising innuendo merely gives material to the ' class war' advocates, and in no way contributes to the solution of the problem we call unemployment? Do they realise that1 by describing relief works douo in Wellington and other cities as a 'ghastly farce' that they (who most likely possess scant knowledge of civil engineering) are maligning the engineers and staff of the civic ernplo3ring authorities? Obviously, the Employers' Federation is blind to the excellent road-mak-ing, removal of dangerous corners, treeplanting, etc., which has been dono in Wellington by relief workers. This slur, so easy to east, and so difficult to refute (to those who have pre-judged the industry of relief workers upon little or no evidence) is worthy only of contempt. The suggestion that we be 'trained and brought to physical fitness' —and taught how to perform useful work, is nonsense. The relief worker is perfectly disciplined at present, and his physical unfitness is not accepted as an excuse for slackness on any relief job to our knowledge. Why does not the Employers' Federation, seek information from the relief workers' employers as to their ability to perform useful work before rushing into print with implications that they cannot do so? All that is required to make any man do his work well, be he employer or employee, is to provide an equitable return for energy expended. The real tragedy, untouched by most of our superior critics, is.the awful moral degeneration permeating thousands of families in New Zealand, and caused solely by the controllers of a system which eonipels decent citizens to adopt the methods used in the slum areas of London, New York, Glasgow, etc., to obtain the common essentials of human existence.... and ... in conclusion, to defer provision of a remedy for this terrible state of affairs until ' our overseas markets expand' is the quintessenco of folly and procrastination."