IDIOSYNCRASIES OF THE AGE

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume LXIV, 13 January 1931, Page 6

IDIOSYNCRASIES OF THE AGE

(To the Editor) Sir.—During the last three months, numerous letters have been contributed to your paper on the unemployment question. We have had detailed -accounts of heart-rending scenes of starving families, etc., while the talking picture shows have been crowded night after night—to say nothing of the latest craze, miniature golf. We hear that ruin is staring the country in the face through the fall in the prices of our primary products. Yet there has been more money spent on motor traffic this last year than ever before known. For the purpose of assisting suffering humanity, the Salvation Army collect millions of pounds (£200,000 in one lump being their latest harvest) which they promptly convert into huge business concerns for profit. These huge business enterprises we hear very little about, while the threepence worth of souj) which they hand out to the poor occasionally is well advertised. Our present Government who pay enormous salaries and pensions to servants of high rank are at their wits’ end to know how to cope with the present unemployment question. And so they systematically impose a flat rate of thirty shillings per annum on the struggling farmer (who is barely existing, often with a family and a big mortgage thrown in) and the General Manager of Railways with his £3OOO salary alike, in order to pay 14s a day to failures, who are generally tired, For non-productive work. While, this extra burden is being imposed on the producer, married couples, many of whom are intentionally childless, both draw large salaries and wallow in extravagano'e and luxury; while many married couples with families are struggling and barely able to make both ends meet. In one of the Governor-General's recent speeches,he emphasised the, necessity to increase the population of New Zealand in order to develop th* country. Surely our own child in the cradle is better than the imported foreigner. It is this intentional childless woman type that creates an extravagant and high standard of living, which makes if doubly hard for the valuable, useful mother, who is the backbone of the country. It is this childless married woman who demands the forty guinea fur coat and the luxurious motor car, at the same time declaring that she couldn’t possibly afford to rear a family. It is this type of woman who is for ever discontented ; who is for ever grasping at the shadow and missing the sunstance ; and who has ruined home life Ruin the home and you ruin the nation. Yet the Government of this country allows these useless women, who have no intention of justifying their existence by reproducing their kind, to “come the double” in the employment market, while many honest breadwinners are going on short allowance. In New South Wales, six hundred married women teachers have been compelled to resign their positions, provided their husbands are receiving £5 or more per week. Any practical person will admit that this is a democratic move in the right direction. If a married couple cannot manage comfortably on five pounds a week, they are too extravagant for the welfare of this country. . Wives who earn salaries receive all the protection pertaining to married life, without shouldering any of the responsibilities. From cases 1 know of in this district it certainly seems that “Whosoever hath to him shall he given, and he shall have more abundance; but whosoever hath not ,from him shall he taken away even that lie hath.” —I am, etc., SOLOMON. Nelson, 12th January.