RELIEF PAY CUT

Hokitika Guardian, 21 December 1932, Page 3

RELIEF PAY CUT

ARCHBISHOP AVERILL’S APPEAL RECONSIDERATION IS URGED. AUCKLAND, December 19. Archbishop Averiil in the course of a statement on the unemployment problem here said: “Toe many attempts to impress upon 'tile Unemployment Boa id the gravity of making a 10 per cent cut m relief pay and sustenance will be endorsed, 1 venture to think, by all .bur-minded a-ilcl. thought, ill citizens. The resolution of the executive of the Council of Christian Congregations and the letter of Archdeacon MacMurrny are sufficient evidence that the church are of one mind in urging upon the Government the seriousness of the stop taken and the terrible hardships inflicted upon thousands of honcrst men and tens of thousands of suffering wives and cfiild-

“£ am aware that there is a desire on the part of many of our citizens to emphasise their feeing in this matter and to make some united appeal to the Government t ( , reconsider this vital question. Processions and demonstrations are ruled out, but perhaps the Mayor might see his way to offer some shell opportunity for expressing our wishes as we feel that the occasion requires. The- Mayor lias already shown liis sincere sympathy with the lot of the unemployed, and will, 1 idol sure, be. prepared to help if it is at all possible.

“The season of Christmas is surely an invitation to all men and women of goodwill to manifest their sympathy one with another and to try and hear one another’s burdens. In spite of all the work of the social organisations, which have clone and are doing their utmost to relieve distress—in .spite ov all the work done b v the Mayor’s Un-

employment Fund and many other agencies, the problem is really to 0 big for the funds at the disposal of local agencies and can only really be met by Government action.

“It is in no sense with the desire to harass the Government or the La hour Department that I put forward this additional plea for a reconsideration of this question, but with the hope that humanitarian considerations may outweight the financial ones. I am conscious of what our request means, but

I am conscious also of the dire need of many brave men, women and children who have no Happy Christmas to look forward to.

“T would appe’al to the men who are compelled to work for relief pay to continue the brave front vihich so many of them have manifested during this trying time and not to jeopardise their own cause by yielding to any ‘go-slow’ policy or doing anything which will weaken the hands of those who are reallv anxious to help them.”