EVICTED TENANTS

Hokitika Guardian, 4 October 1932, Page 8

EVICTED TENANTS

CASE OF HARDSHIP. A WOMAN’S PLIGHT. ‘ 'SYDNEY, 'September 23. A certain 'amount of sensation has been produced in the usually stolid public mind by particulars ot an eviction case reported from Bondi. Mrs M’Lean is a trained nurse, her husband is a skilled builder, but neither of them ca.iv get work, and so they cannot pay rent. They have been in Court on eviction notices eleven times, and this is 'the second time that they h'a'v,e been* turned out of houses in Boiidi. Tliis time they spent four nights on the sidewalk, with the relics of their furniture■ (piled! round them, and, as Mrs McLean pathetically says, “one never knows the real value ot a roof over one’s head till one has

slept under a table on the hard concrete w»th a gale blowing.” It happens that the weather recently has been wet and cold enough for winter, and, though neighbours have sheltered the eight-year-old daughter, the M’Leans most of 'the time ‘haw had only a sheet to protect them from the driving Wind and rain. Then, after some days,- -the’: Waverley Borough Council served them a twentyfour hours’ notice to “quit” the street, and they -were left absolutely without money or shelter. • Happily, a good Samaritan who has a “commodious dwelling of seventeen rooms”, empty at Vaneluse, offered it to these (hapless people, 'and for-the moment they are rescued. But these nights in the open, in stormy weather, with, no prospects for the future, must oe ' an ordeal that no human beings ought to be called upon to face in a civilisedcountry. , This week a wide , Mrs Walsh, appeared in the Balhnain Court 1 to -show - cause why she should not be turned into 1 the (street, the three months allowed by the Ejectments Positpoiu.ment Act having expired! She told the-Court: “I have been without food for three days. Iffiave’no clothes and no- shoes.’? She has a boy of eighteen who can get no work, but is on the .defle; she herself receives no dole, but 10s a week as widow’s (pension. tone owes about- £35 rent, a.nd she cannot , work, through sciatica and heart .■trouble. It is.indeedVa pitiable case; yet ’there was somethirjg to be said on ( the' landlord’s side. This man is eighty-two years old, depending wholly on his rents, and his income has fallen from £4 4s a week to less than £2. The Magistrate found that, if the ejectment were postponed indefinitely, the -landlord would “suffer undue hardship'”; and he let matters stand for a month. But -what is to become of Mrs Walsh 1 then ? -And what is to become of thel M’Leans and hundreds more in their -position in this great and wealthy -city? The housing' probVui alone is difficult-to hilhdle, but when it is conjoined with unemployment >« the present:, scale, it 1 becomes . pnacfcicv’lly insoluble. ' ’ A • >■ 1 at. . v-