The Stratford Evening Post. WITH WHICH IS INCORPORATED THE EGMONT SETTLER. THURSDAY, JANUARY 2, 1913. WORK AND WORKERS.

Stratford Evening Post, Volume XXXV, Issue 6, 2 January 1913, Page 4

The Stratford Evening Post. WITH WHICH IS INCORPORATED THE EGMONT SETTLER. THURSDAY, JANUARY 2, 1913. WORK AND WORKERS.

An especially pleasing feature at this present ttme is the fact that although hundreds of men have been discharged from co-operative works throughout New Zealand, there are really very few unemployed, and with the abundance of farm work offering, there need toe practically none. Of course, there are shirkers who do not want to find work, in every community, but in these parts one js thankful to find comparatively few who come under that denomination. In that very remarkable land of the Swiss, the authorities deal with the workless and the indigent on principles of true economy, holding that idle persons, if left to their own devices, are likely to become unemployable, and that for a community to allow one of its members who is capable of work to remain unemployed is a public waste. No toleration is shown to the loafer. Begging is prevented by law, and vagrancy is classed as a crime in the code. The unemployed person must make a serious effort to find work, and if he does not, then the authorities will do it for him. If he will not work, then he is placed in a workhouse, where military discipline is maintained, and where he finds he must exercise himself to his fullest capacity. He, of course, receives board and lodging, and, in addition, a wage varying from three halfpence to fivepence a day. Possibly . some such scheme would have its uses in the large centres, but really what the Dominion wants is more men and women and an active immigration policy. A shipload of domestic helps could bo absorbed without the least trouble in almost any of the larger towns, and the country would be all the better off for the influx. There is room in New Zealand for quite a lot more people in almost every walk and calling.