A PROGRESSIVE CITY

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LIV, Issue 101, 19 October 1911, Page 7

A PROGRESSIVE CITY

INTERVIEW WITH MKS. BARTON Colonials may be pardoned, perhaps, for believing that the women who take i pnrt in the social reform movement in | the Old Country are of the militant suf- j fragist type. The cables are full of the ; doings and methods of women who aim at reforming the race by overturning ' the ]iresent system and evolving out of ! the chaos some radical changes. Horsej whipping Ministers of the Crown, smashi ing windows, and throning stones at i ])rominent statesmen am feat, that are [ associated in our minds with raw-boned, high-cheeked, angular women. We have never heard much about those other women who have undertaken the real work of -social reform in an unostentatious manner. One of these is Mrs. Barton, at present in New Plymouth, and she is not one of the angular, horsewhipping variety by any means. She's a pleasant, lmxom Scotchwoman, full of humor, and evidently an enthusiastic and commonsense worker in the upbuilding of humanity. Mrs. Barton is an ex-council-lor of the city of Glasgow, and the corporation of Glasgow is one of the most progressive in the world in such matters as the .better housing of its people, and so on. She is in New Plymouth in connection with the no-license campaign, I and addresses meetings this afternoon • and this evening, but her conversation I with a Daily News reporter yesterday left the licensing question severely alone. Mrs. Barton said she had iheen en- j gaged in slum work and social work for twenty years. She spoke of the forward policy of the Glasgow authorities in re; gard, for instance, to sanitation. There was a very big staff of sanitary inspectors, necessary on account of the crowded buildings ami the very thickly populated I areas where the working classes live. These tenement areas, with their narrow closes and stairs, are regularly visited by the inspectors, by day and by night. The tenements are single-roomed and | two-roomed', and the corporation provides I that a one-roomed place must accommodate no more than four people. The rules in this regard must be strictly adhered to, and the inspectors have authority to demand admittance. There are now very fine model dwellings erected by the corporation and let to the working classes at a cheap rate, these places containing every modern convenience. I The city of Glasgow has done and is , , still doing much in regard to the lious- 1 ing of its people. Mrs. Barton says that before the days of these restrictions things were very bad in some localities.j Mention was made of the difference | between the liquor bars there and the j hotels here, there being no boarding ae-1 commodntion provided in the former case, I but merely the place for the sale of i drink. Often these liquor saloons were I planted thickly in poor districts where the people's power of resistance was none too strong, owing to their being not too ' well fed and not overloaded with comforts. So the corporation took a referen- } dum on the question of reducing the num-1 her of saloons, and the people decided to reduce the number by fifty in the various ! wards of the city. I , Then, said Mrs. Barton, the c«rpara-1 tion provided nice baths and free librar- ' ics for both children and adults, and these were used very largely. Open spaces had been converted into playgrounds, and there were swings for the children, and gymnasiums, whilst they I bad also been successful in having the! school playgrounds left open till dusk ! for the children. '"We recognise." said J Mrs. Barton, "that the child is our best asset, and we are taking care of it, seeing that it gets plenty of fresh air, and that it is not always huddled away with a lot of others." This brought her to the subject of infant mortality. Glasgow's rate being one of the best in the Old World. The infant death-rate had been very high, particularly in what they called the -black" part' of the city, where lived very depraved people aiid people in the lowest stratum of society. | Some years ago twenty women volun- j teered to endeavor to remedy this state ' of affairs. Their plan was to visit every house where a child was born in this area and to look after the child for the first year of its life. Then the corporation granted nurses and doctors, and by these means they had reduced the infant mortality enormously. Now the , city was encompassed by -100 infant j health visitors, all voluntary workers, j Mrs. Barton was on the executive of this •■ organisation, and was one of the first twenty who started it. Instead of resenting the visits of these people the women in the homes rather welcomed j them. Of course, the executive had to see to it that the women appointed were of the right sort, not aggressive or goin" • about their work with an air of su- I periority. but going and talking as wo-1 man to woman, having sympathy for the mothers and their hearts in tile work. This visiting, combined with the other social work, was having the effect of levelling up the whole tone of the home, and the visitors were able to see whether individuals who sank went down as the result of their own misbehaviour, want of employment, or want of proper re- I numeration for their work. They were I adapting to Glasgow the German system of almoners, providing food, money, and work for people who were unemployed through no fault of their own, and punishing those who neglected their opportunities. Mrs. Barton said she had been three times elected to the parish council, elected on the Parliamenatry constituency boundaries. She had stood a con- I test against five men, and was returned j at the top of the poll on each occasion. I There, were now four women on that . body. t I Mrs. Barton said she believed in wo-\ men having equal voting rights with j men, but had no sympathy with the tac- ' tics adopted by the militant suffragists. She recounted an incident connected with a big women's demonstration at Albert Hall. The meeting was arranged bv those who believed in setting about the movement in a constitutional fashion, and was spoiled by women of th'e violent type, one of whom laid a horse-whip about Mr. Elovd-Georgc. Tt was a pity the cause should be set back in that way. j for women wen; the uplifters of morality, and should be given a say in the Government of the country. A wider i franchise had been promised, but there was no immediate chance at Home of obtaining the adult suffrage that was the ] rule in New Zealand.

Coming back to social reform, Mrs. ,Barton outlined tlie work of the parish council. It's objective was to look after the lioaltli and lives of the people, the unfortunate poor, and the derelicts of society who had wasted their opportunities and prostituted their gifts, and this brought them into touch with the \fcospitals. lunatic asylums, and poortiouses. It was most interesting work, Hit, there wu- always this feeling, that I they were dealing with the cll'ecls and jiot getting at the cau-e. A more imjportant work, and a more satisfying one. was llial amongst the children, for in I.'that they could do some good in living I Jhe live, ~t' !!;:• rUing genera'ion ami ' nicking -gooil citizen*. What llicv wanted was for the Government to ',nake it. \ easier foi- the citizens to do right, and i less difficult for them to do wrong. | "One of the reasons of my coming to i the colonies." she continued, "was to see what legislation had been framed here,

, and lo 1n,.;.; into the conditions of life in the cities and towns out here." Mrs. ( Barton confessed that she had been disi tressed to liml what existed in Mel- • bourne. Sydney. Brisbane, and. to a .lesser extent, in Adelaide. These places I had grown into big cities, leaving such great tracts of country unpopulated. It was delightful in New Zealand to see how the people had stretched out, and t instead of finding people huddled up il ' •«e big city there were half-a-dozen bij towns and numerous fair-sized towns This was .better for the country, for it was better for the health, of its people. New Zealand appealed to her as a \^ry' fine country, in which, with its climate and fine water supplies, there, was no reason why the people should not be healthy and well. But the land mv.s seemed in need of improvement, so that the thousands of acres of unoccupied land could be settled upon. This, she thought, ivoiilil never be a big manufacturing country, owing to distance from the great centres of population and consumption, but it should develop into a big agricultural country and should supply much more of the food of the people in the Old Country. ' At Home she had fasted Canterbury mutton and Australian butter and cheese, and liked it well, but the cheese here was prime. She had a big compliment for Roslyn wool. Knitting was her occupation when travelling, and she knitted a very great deal. She must say that the Roslyn wool was the finest wool she had ever knitted with. Tn the schools she had visited she had .been struck with the line healthy appearance of the children and their cleverness and quickness in taking up what was put before them. "These children are of the great- ■ t value," she urged emphatically, "take ' od C'e of them." That was her last ~. rd- -for the children.