POVERTY—AND POVERTY

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 770, 17 September 1929, Page 11

POVERTY—AND POVERTY

DISCRIMINATION FOR BUSINESSMEN BOGUS RELIEF CASES How receiving applications for reiief are protected by the Auckland Businessmen’s Relief Service in ..distinguishing unworthy requests was told today by the Rev. C. G. Scrimgeour, organiser for the service. Mr. Scrimgeour was speajdng at the luncheon of the Karangahape Road Business Promotion Society. He emphasised the need to know men who made a practice of applying for relief from genuine cases. “There are two distinct kinds of poverty," Mr. Scrimgeour said. "There is what I shall call ‘natural poverty.’ People in it are the type always dependent on support. Although they are a charge on the community, there is no reason for not handling them in a business fashion. Then there are the sufferers from •economic poverty’ —people thrown into want by unemployment and force of circumstances. As a class they are comparatively new in New Zealand. This kind of poverty is worse than a plague. It destroys home life, panders to immorality and stunts ambition. Once a home is stripped, the young people are driven out, the father perhaps finds comfort in the bar-room, and the mother finds there is nothing for which her care is wanted. "We were never meant to have the existence of this sort of thing. It should be abolished, and I have hopes that it will. We can make the mistake of regarding these two classes of poverty as one. The normal man, suffering from economic poverty, does noi; like asking for charity. “Members of the other class, however. are often well practised in approaching businessmen with plausible stories of distress. The businessman has not the time to discern and that is where the relief service helps by judging applications referred to it by the businessman.” Continuing. Mr. Scrimgeour said that when the service was first under consideration, a case was discovered in which a man, a son of an ex-member of Parliament, had received over £IOO from Auckland businessmen in two week-ends.

“We feel the organisation is doing a tremendous amount of good in stopping this sort of thing.” he said. “The feature which has made me devote IS months to the service is that we are weeding out many of the professional ‘cadger’ type. In the past winter, we have spent nearly £ 1,000 and every penny has been accounted for.” Mr. Scrimgeour said professional beggars were being driven into the cuter parts of Auckland, and the service intended to follow them with its protection for businessmen.