The Daily News. WEDNESDAY, APRIL 23, 1902. ALLEGED CHILD SLAVERY IN TARANAKI.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume XXIV, Issue 92, 23 April 1902, Page 2

The Daily News. WEDNESDAY, APRIL 23, 1902. ALLEGED CHILD SLAVERY IN TARANAKI.

These appears to be a deaire in Wellington to emulate the action of the boy who is said to have, in his search after knowledge, killed the geose which laid the golden eggs. These busybodies, envious of the prosperity of Taranaki, are now trying to raise a grievance in reference to child labour in the milking industry. Whether these people are actuated by a desiru for the welfare of the children, or to promote the interests of a syndicate desirous of introducing a milking machine lately patented, we leave our readers to decide for themselves. Some time ago we saw a letter, written by a financial agent in Wellington, to a gantleman in Taranaki, asking for information regarding children engaged in connection with the dairy industry. Full details were asked for regarding 1 any children milking cow«, their ages,! number of cows milked, distance from sehools, ate. Now the Wellington Evening Post has taken up the question, and in the course of an hysterical screech says: —" It is plain that it will only be by constant iteration of their wrongs that there will come any betterment of the condition of the little white slaves of the dairy industry of this country. The opportunist politician is afraid to incur the illwill of the numerous country settlers who make money by the syrstem. Ministers of the Grown fear to attack the iniquity Irst the votes of the country party will be cast against them. The Farmers' Union is keen for reform, but not in a direction that will take from the profits of its member*. The Trades and Labonr Council as the Parliament of Labour must surely desire to help th 6 cause of the little drudges of the dairies, but it looks as though it Ui afraid, else why is it silent? If the I labour unions are sincere in what they j preich, why do they not protest.! through their executive? And what of the Christian preachers ? . . . . Ministers of the Crown, politicians, and .Labour leaders alike turn a deof ear tosthese wrong?, and they will not hear until the moral sense of the community is so stirred that they must swim with the tide. We appeal to the clergy to help in the good work-that lies specially within their province. If they will consent to bring home to their congregations the hurt and injury t» the minds and body of these i unfortunate children, how their future is being marred by the conditions of 'slavery under which they are now j compfilled to live, the preachers of the city may inspire a senss of moral re- ! sentmsnt as well as pity among their h- arers that should make each of them a worker for redemption of the lot of tie bush children. The State does i>ot stir. Will the preochers." The Auckland < bserver also has a ridiculous picture of a wretched looking family, dres*e4 in rsgs, goisg out to ths milking shed from a squalid looking dwelling, the embodiment of misery. Now anyone who knows the truth is aware hut there is no foundation for this ouuery, that the children of the dairy farmers of Taranaki will compare more than favourably with those of any

other parfc of New Zealand. We Ventura to say that age for age the children of Taranaki will give the children of Wellington, or any other large city, half a stone in w#i»ht all round, while the yaung men and women, born aad bred here, will in f very respect compare favourably with those raised in i the cities, where no milking is done. I Take any gathering of the people, and '■ a happier, bitter dressed, contented, more prosperous lot of men nnd women acd children cannot ba found anywhere. Take the occasion nf th' recent, band contest, when cvor 8000 people, many of whom wore children, were assembled, and there was an entire absence of any evidence of the evi's complained of by our Wellington on temporary. If our contemporary had written in the days when little children had to go out; and piek fungus and save gnws-sead, wh.oi parents found it difficult to make both ends meet, he could have made out a good case. Then the lot of tbe children was hard, but now the bright, happy, and intelligent faeea of the well fed, well clothed childrea, to bo seen in every school, gives the direct lin to every word which our contemporary has written in support of his contention.