UNEMPLOYED COUNCIL.

Evening Star, Issue 21745, 13 June 1934, Page 14

UNEMPLOYED COUNCIL.

■ TO THE EDITOR.

Sir,—lgnorant ” wishes to know something about the'newly-formed District Council of Otago. 1 will try and give him the information he wants. First, the council is a council, of unemployed men; it has been set up for the purpose of co-ordinating the activities of the various unemployed organisations in and around Dunedin. At the present moment the council comprises two representatives from the Dunedin 'Workers’ Friendly Society (North-east Valley), two from the Dunedin North Unemployed Association, two from the Dunedin Central Branch of the National Unemployed Workers’ Movement, two from the Morning Lon Belief Workers' Club, two from the Dunedin South Unemployed Association, and two from the St. Kilda Unemployed Association. The council will eventually have every unemployed movement in Otago affiliated to it; that is if they realise that unity means strength. The unemployed in Dunedin for a long time battled along with their separate organisations, making separate appeals to the powers that be with very little effect. Now they have realised that if they are going to get the bare necessities of life for themselves and their wives and children, united action is necessary. It is regretable that this stale of affairs should ever have become necessary in- this beautiful and fertile country of ours. We have plenty of food, clothing, and shelter for_ every man, woman, and child in. New Zealand to-day, and if

we have not got those things, why do we keep 100,000 men and women idle, who, are ready .and willing to work? No member of the Unemployed Committee is on. the District Council. If “ Ignprant ” is an unemployed man it is qiute obvious he is not pulling his weight, or he would know all about the newly-formed council. Your correspondent asks “ Has the world gone crazy?” Well, Bernard Shaw called it the asylum for all the other planets. We are burning food because people cannot buy it. also cotton for the same reason, yet millions of people are hungry and cold; and we are told Christ died that men might have life and have it more abundantly. This is enough. The unemployed arc getting together: they have formed a district council; the frightful immoral conduct of the rich and powerful lias justified all action taken by the poor in the past, and will also lustily it in the future. —1 am, etc., F. O 7 llokke, June 12. Hon. Secretary.