In the News

Southland Times, Issue 24830, 24 August 1942, Page 4

In the News

Quota Again Reached

Invercargill again reached its national savings quota of £2043 last week, though a big drive was needed on Saturday morning to achieve this result. The city has now attained, or beaten, its quota for 40 weeks in succession, a record unsurpassed by any other town in New Zealand with a population of more than 25,000. In some weeks the quota has been easily exceeded so it is likely that through this form of saving alone Invercargill has contributed about £lOO,OOO to the war effort. The result is largely due to continuous organizing work by members of the Invercargill National Savings Committee. V.C. Buried in Hamburg Sergeant Pilot J. A. Ward, V.C., was buried in the cemetery in Hamburg, Ohlsdorf, Germany, after his death in a bomber raid last September. Advice to this effect was forwarded by the International Red Cross Committee, Geneva, through the British Red Cross Society, to the Director of Personal Services, British Air Ministry. The liaison officer at New Zealand House, London, in turn communicated with Sergeant Pilot Ward’s brother in England, who has forwarded copies of the correspondence to his parents, Mr and Mrs P. H. Ward, Wanganui. Mortars for Home Guard An offer of a donation of 14 trench mortars has been made by the Awake New Zealand Campaign Committee to the Home Guard, subject to the approval of the Army. There has been considerable delay in securing this approval. The secretary of the committee, Mr M. M. Shaw, stated that the committee was willing to spend over £lOOO on Home Guard equipment if the Army would only specify the equipment required and authorize its purchase. So far as the mortars were concerned, Mr Shaw said if the Army would only approve of their use for training purposes some good would be achieved. Those that had been made locally cost £2O, as against £l2O, the value of the Army issue. \ Money Supply

An increase in New Zealand’s money supply during the war to the extent of £42,800,000 is announced in the annual report of the Reserve Bank of New Zealand. The principal reason for this increase has been that the Dominion’s receipts from overseas since September 1939, exceeded the external expenditure by £22,300,000, as shown by the rise in the combined assets . of the Reserve Bank and the trading banks during that period. Credit expansion in New Zealand is also a factor, and is shown as follows: Advances by the Reserve Bank increased by £9,800,000; holdings of securities in New Zealand by the trading banks increased by £13,900,000, offset by a fall in advances, which makes the net increase £9,900,000. Notes held by the public have increased since September 1939, by £6,800,000. . Teaspoon Substitute Slivers of. wood, evoking from most customers a first thought of chopsticks, are being served with cups and saucers in some Auckland tearooms as substitutes for irreplaceable metal teaspoons. These wooden stirring implements are 4in long and jin wide, with rounded ends. Cheap Soup at School For some time, 80 pupils of the Macandrew Intermediate School, Dunedin, have’ been receiving half a pint of hot soup daily for a nominal charge of Id. The smallness of the charge has been possible, because all the vegetables used in the soup have been grown by the pupils themselves . in the school gardens, and the soup itself is rnade by the pupils attending the schools home science department. < Farmer’s Long Hours

“I do not think any man, even in medieval times, was intended to work the hours you describe,” said Mr A. M. Samuel, a member of the No. 1 (Auckland) Armed Forces Appeal Board, to a farmer who said he and his brother worked from 1 a.m. to 6 p.m. for seven days a week. The witness said he went to bed at 7 p.m. if he was not called out on E.P.S. work. The long hours had become necessary since the mans son went to camp. The reservist’s release was sought, and was recom.ienaea by the board. '

The Hermitage Information that'-the lease of the Hermitage, Mount Cook, had reverted to flie Government was given, in the House of Representatives by the Minister of Internal Affairs (Mr W. E. Pany) when the supplementary estimates for the Tourist and Publicity Department were passed. One item made provision for £5OOO for maintenance of the Hermitage, the sum being required to cover the cost of running the hotel. “Has the Government taken that building over?” asked Mr H. S. S. Kyle (National, Riccarton), and Mr Parry replied that it had. The Minister of Industries and Commerce (Mr D. G. Sullivan) said that it belonged to the State, and the lease had expired. Mr Kyle asked if the Government itself intended to fun the_ Hermitage, and Mr Sullivan replied in the affirmative-. Mr Parry said that it would be kept open on a very much reduced scale. Horticultural Rarity

A small potato has a place of honour in a Wellington horticultural shop window. Alone in its glory in the centre of the window, it is labelled Solanum Tuberosum —a rare plant,” and underneath is added: “We regret we cannot supply.” The same shop a few days ago had on exhibition as a loan from a customer, a freak potato which, by a combination of several constituent tubers, was shaped very much like a man. So many people wanted to buy it, with a view presumably to cutting it up for planting, that it became necessary to withdraw it from exhibition; it became tedious repeating' that they were sorry, but it was not for sale.