BRITISH & FOREIGN ITEMS

Hokitika Guardian, 28 January 1922, Page 3

BRITISH & FOREIGN ITEMS

AUSTRALIAN AND N.Z. CABLE ASSOCIATION AVIATORS’ TRADE UNION. LONDON, January 26. The civil air pilots are organising a Trade Union. They do this in "'order to stabilise their rates of remuneration, and to improve their working conditions, particularly those relating to casual flights. The regular cross-Channel fliers will now receive a wage of £SOO yearly, plus a bonus according to the mileage flown.

BIG COTTON FRAUDS LONDON, January 26

Ernest Terah Hooley, Thomas Fletcher (ex-Mayor of Derby), John Angus MacDonald (ex-Mayor of Folkestone), Thomas Llewellyn Demerjy (Hooloy’s secretary), William Alfred Wallis (solicitor), and Bernrand Breakspear ((Hooley’s clerk) are all being prosecuted at Bow Street.

They are charged with a conspiracy to defraud in connection with the flotation of . the Jubilee Cotton Mills, Limited; at Oldham.

The prosecution alleged that Demery induced, one Lewis, a wealth young Cardiff ship-owner, to invest. £60,000 by a false statement. Lewis did not know of Hooiev'p connection with the project. The latter was studiously keeping in the background.

GERMANY’S EFFORT TO PAY. LONDON January 26. The “Daily Chronicle’s” Berlin cor--1 respondent states that the Government has obtained a promise Pf sup- > port from :he Reichstag majority for a compulsory loan bringing in £50,000 000 for the payment of reparations. 1 It is believed that, the Allies will regard this as a , atisfactory reply to the Reparations Commission’s demands at Cannes, accompanied by a period of grace, expiring to-day, for informs-, tion regarding Gdmany’s financial reforms to meet in* reparations. ROSS SMITH’S PREPARATIONS. LONDON, January 26. / Mr Rosg Smith has completed arrangements for a world flight. He reluctantly abandoned) ’his first idea, which was to race in an aeroplane I against a- disused afirship, which he hoped to borrow from the Air Minis- j try and man with a volunteer crew, i which is s till obtainable. Mr Smith j proposed to have six weeks’ start of 1 the ai r ship, by which time ho would j have reached. Japan with luck, going I via Russia, and while the airship made for San Francisco direct, smith would I have reached America, via (Alaska. ! The airship would then follow the | R 34 route while the aeroplane wont' via j Azores. I

j The Air Ministry, however, waa not , sympathetic, and refused to allow any airship to fly, pending a decision whether it was required for Imperial service. However, if £30,000 can be collected’ it is still possible to build a small, airship which would be able to give Ross-Smith a race. GRANTS TO UNEMPLOYED. LONDON, Jan 26. . Several hundred of the unemployed; to-day besieged the Poplar Board of [ Poor Guardians’ offices. They were de- > maning an increase in the outdoor relief'. allowances. They took possession of Uie< i building while negotiations were pro- j ceeding. j Eventually the Guardians decided to j grant the following relief allowances,.! "’hich are larger even than th e unemployed dfemands:— ■ ; Two pounds per week for a man and his wife; six shillings for each child under sixteen; 15s for rent, and one . hundred-weight of coal. ,