The Feilding Star. SATURDAY, MARCH 27, 1886. The Unemployed

Feilding Star, Volume VII, Issue 123, 27 March 1886, Page 2

The Feilding Star. SATURDAY, MARCH 27, 1886. The Unemployed

The question of finding work for the unemployed in the colony is becoming rather involved by the action of the men themselves. It is well-known the Government and public bodies have done their best to meet the difficulty, so much so that at one time we hoped it had been overcome altogether. We observe, however, from our telegrams of the last few days, that the desired end is as far off as eyer. In Dunedin the men on the relief works struck work owing to the action of the Government in reducing the rate of pay from 48 6d to 4s per day. They waited on the Mayor of the City, and during the interview behaved very badly, but unfortunately the Mayor allowed himself to lose his temper, and to call one of the men " a loafer" for which the latter sued his Worship. Althongh the case was dismissed, yet the authority of this official must be considerably lessened by the false position in which he placed himself. The upshot of the matter was that the City Council agreed to the demands of the men, and the 6d a day was restored pending advice from the Government. In Hokitika the demands of the unemployed appear to have been on a more extended scale. The whole body, numbering 85 men, struck work, demanding peace work at a price which would give good navvies 12s per day, or the alternative of 7s per day all round, by which good men would be remunerated at the same rate as the worst worksmen among them. This modest request being refused by the overseer, some of the men went to work again for a day or two to see if they could afford to work for such poor wages. The more sensitive and proud among them preferred loafing about town, where they drowned their sorrows in drink under the influence of which some were indiscreet, and consequently had to appear in the Police Courts, charged with drunkenness. In order to improve on this state of affairs, the Hon. E. Richardson telegraphed to the Mayor of Christchurch that he would^make further provision for the married men unemployed there, by sending the single men, now at work fdr the City Council, to the West Coast, letting the married men take their places. With the knowledge that the men employed on the relief works at Hokitika were out on strike, this order seems anomalous, inasmuch as the Christchurch contingent on arrival at their destination will, very likely, either " join the ranks of the disaffected" or not be allowed by the latter to work at all. We must not omit to mention that the portage of these men is a somewhat heavy item of expenditure to the colony. From the causes we have quoted it appears, we may 'safely draw the inference that there are, congregated in the large cities of the colony, a number of men who are anxious and willing to eat the bread of idleness at the expense of the more industrious colonists. It is all nonsense for blatant communistic demagogues to say they cannot live on 4a 6d a day in

Dunedin and Christchurch, or 7s a day in Hokitika. The Hon. Mr Stout quoted his own case where he lived well on 5s a day when he first came to the colony, and there are thousands of other instances in the colony where "the honorable poor" are living on even less without uttering a word of complaint. These submit to be deprived of the luxuries of " beer and baccy" that their families maybe well fed and well clad. But we fear this sort of self denial is far beyond the " lusty unemployed" who would barter his independance for a pot of ale. Men are not educated into habits of self reliance in the towns. Such, education can only be acquired in the country. Yet it is in the towns that the average " working men" love to congregate. A country life appears to have no charms for them although work can always be obtained by those who seek it. We may take the case of this coast from that point where the Wellington - Manawatu railway touches the sea, up to the furthest limits of Taranaki. Within these limits we are proud to say there are not fifty families badly off, and if any single men be idle they are so from choice, living comfortably on the outcome of past labor. We have no idlers ; therefore the voice of the "pot house politician" is not heard in the land. The latter is a fungoid growth of cities only. The .Government, as well as the several public bodies, appear to be sincere in their efforts to do good, but we think it a blunder to remove the unemployed from one large city to another, at a considerable cost to the country. Men working on relief works never did, since such were first used to relieve poverty and distress, werk with all their hearts and strength. .If they are men at all their labors are done under a sense of humiliation and a feeling of injustice inflicted on them. They are called paupers and the term gallß them. Let the Government send a few hundred married men to make roads in the back country, to intersect the VVanganui Harbor Board Block and adjacent Grown Lands. This would give more honorable employment than on mere "relief works." They would find the money well inY\sted, besides having the advantage of planting a hard-working population on land which is surpassed by none in the colony, but which now only provides a home for wild cattle.