WOMEN AND THE WAR.

Pukekohe & Waiuku Times, Volume 6, Issue 270, 27 April 1917, Page 2

WOMEN AND THE WAR.

"Great Britain could not win the war without its women. If they were to be taken out of the spheres of national industry into which they have gone since the war started, Great Britain would crumple up." That was the emphatic reply given by Cecil Harmsworth, brother of Lord Northcliffe, and head of the Women's War Employment Commission, in answer to a question by the New York Times correspondent as to the part England's women are playing in the war. For two years, Mr Harmsworth, as head of this important commission that has been directing the employment of women in war work, has had opportunity of judging exactly the value of their work. He regards Britain's "war women," as he calls them, as being equally as important as the soldiers in khaki in carrying on the war. "We have just a trifle over 1,000,000 women doing men's work at home," said Mr Harmsworth. "We might easily have three times that number or four times, if wo took all who are eager to do their bit. Up to now we have not needed any moro than the million who are at work. They are in every conceivable character of work, from the girls who run lifts or work in butchers' shops to those making shells in the munition factories. We have them in banks, in jobs as 'bus conductors, in clerical work, in governmental offices, and in agricultural work. Wo have them everywhere. And it may be put on record that Great Britain's women have with amazing rapidity adapted themselves to the work of men, whether in heavy drudgery or in the gentler pursuits where finesse is an indispensable requisite." In the same self-denying way, although in a different form, the women of New Zealand have risen to the occasion and have done their sh >re towards providing comfjrts etc., for " Our Boys " who have departed from these shores to assist the Mother Land in h;-r time of need.