AN UNPOPULAR CALLING.

Kaipara and Waitemata Echo, 29 May 1919, Page 3

AN UNPOPULAR CALLING.

Tho shortage of domestic helps in Auckland (and in most^other places, for that matter) continues, and is likely to continue indefinitely unless the conditions of service are considerably altered. The simple fact of the matter is that Mary Jane considers washing up dishes and making beds beneath her, and she. is also I impressed iwith the notion that socially she is. quite as good as her mistress. The recent correspondence on the subject of domestic service in an Auckland daily paper fully bore out this view of the matter, the writer of one of the letters frankly complaining that she was not treated as an equal by her mistress, and was not invited by the latter to help her entertain visitors when they called. That, of course, was an absurdity, but when the girl* complain that,they have no fixetr hours, and that in some households their work is never

done, it becomes possible" to sympathise with them, and to understand why the shop, the factory, and the workroom are preferred by so many of them to doing household work for other people. But if the girls 'frave reason to find fault, in many cases, with the mistresses, the mistresses may be excused, in many cases, for complaining of the girls who are frequently incompetent to perform the duties they are paid to undertake. Apropos of this, Mrs Baume mad« a valuable suggestion at last meeting of Auckland Education Board when she advocated a special course of training by the Education Department for girls willing to enter domestic service. Such a course, this lady pointed out, concluding with a diploma or certificate, would serve to raise the status of domestic work, besides helping the girls to qualify for the time when they had homes of their own to look after.