WORK FOR ALL

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 646, 24 April 1929, Page 7

WORK FOR ALL

MR STALLWORTHY ON "unemployment BETTER TIME COMING . yjgorous defence of the United rovernment’i unemployment polwes made by the Mini.ter of HMlth, the Hon. A. J. Stallworthy, oeeking at the Empire Theatre, Dominion Road, last evening, flie occasion was the presentation prizes won during the recent shopwißdow display in the district, under tie auspices of the Eden Chamber of Commerce. With the permission of the chairn jir. H. Cliffe, Mr. Stallworthy ma de a brief reference to the political situation. ' He said the Government was alive (0 the importance of keeping the itrople of tJle Dominion usefully employed. In a community where a jtrge number of citizens are out of work, the effect is felt by the whole business community. Thus it was up to a community to ,ee that its men were employed. The Conservative Press had said itiat the Government was transferring die responsibility on to the local bodies- Unemployment, the Minister M id, was not the fault of the present Government, which had been in office {or only four short months. The Government knew that in the cities rhere were a great many unemployed, Sit in other parts of the Dominion « problem did not exist. There were many districts where all the people yere profitably employed and doing quite well. IF REFORM WAS IN “K had also been said by the Conservative Press that conditions were Just as bad under the present Govfrnment as under the last GovernMat,” the Minister remarked. “I am going to say quite deliberately,” said Mr. Stallworthy, “that the unemployment position to-day ~t% very much improved on what it wa* one or two months ago.” As bad as the position is in Auckrd to-day, it would have been twice three times as bad had we not had • change in administrative policy. The position would have been really atrious and there would have been at IhMt two or three times as many uuhad that change not taken It has often been asked, What has the United Government done? stated the Health Minister. That question is answered when you realise that over £2,000,000 has been liberated by the Government in four months to assist the workless, he said. He stated that when the Government took over it found that applications for advances had been in the office in Wellington for two years. “Within four months we have cleaned up this back list.” Another way in which the Government had assisted the employment question was stopping the influx of assisted immigrants to glut the labour market. SUNSHINE SOON Further, the Government had made very clear its policy in regard to interference in private enterprise. it was developing a policy for the benefit of the country. It had made a very solid contribution to the advance of the country. The Minister asked if any reasonable person would think that after a policy had been in operation for 10 years along certain administrative lines, and followed by difficulties in the economic life in the country, a Uovernment in four months could be expected to bring in the millenium. He assured the meeting that the plight of the workless was near the heart of every member of the Cabiaet. Mr. Stallworthy concluded by saying that the Government would hFing in an era of prosperity. “I am quite satisfied that that era will come, and that we will once more get into the sunshine of a better day,” he said.