HOW THE PUBLIC ARE DUPED.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LVII, Issue 99, 22 September 1914, Page 2

HOW THE PUBLIC ARE DUPED.

(From an English Paper). Like the heathen Chinee, tho ways of certain oiganisers of charity are dark and peculiar. The late Earl of Sfciftesbury estimated that by means of street collectors bogus charitable institutions m Englxnd mulcted the public of between £300,000 and £400,000 a your. Comimenving on a, case at MarlborouMi street, i:i which he fined a street celltctor for obstruction, the Magistrate said: 'lt is a scandalous tiling that these < ollections should be allowed to take pu„e without any safeguards." Discussing this question of streetegging for bogus charities, Mr. E. C. Price, who specialises in this branch of the Charity Organisation's work, said thai the evil was increasing rapidly. Some of the points on which he laid special emphasis , were:—Many street collectora for bogus charities are innocent dupes supplied through the labor exchanges. The expert "band" can collect between £3 and £4 a week, and make a regular income of between 30s and £3 o. week. Young girls tare induced to become collectors by advertisements and other means, often to the serious detriment of the future. Business men, by their careless generosity in doling jut half-crowns to collectors, tire encouraging tbfc practice of collecting from office to office in London. Th» terms of remuneration vary. The collectors for one iiwtit/ution are expected to work for nothing, but are allowed "out of pocket" expenses. This elastic term includes omnibus and railway fares, luncheons and dinners at restaurants, part of cost of clothing, boots, etc., and a quarter of the net sum collected weekly from house to house while distributing free dinner tickets. In other cases quoted by Mr. Price collectors are paid regular salaries;—

Lady collectors for an "orphanage" paid £1 a week and commission; total 30a. For another "charity" six women regularly employed emptying stationary collecting boxes at ISs a week and "travelling expense*." A children's free meal society pays an army of collectors 33 a day and "travelling expenses." A medical "charity" pays collectors 10s a week and "commission." A bogus blind aid society pays women collectors 6s a week and 25# per cent, commission on takings."

"When the finances of a South Coast orphanage were unravelled at Bow Street," said Mr. Trice, "it was found that out of £I2OO amassed by street collectors only £7O could bo traced to the official account at the bank. The books showed extensive turf operations. The promoter of a society with 10,006 collecting boxes in restaurants and public houses in London and the province* lives iu affluence, and sent his son 3 to the university. In onother case a man paid collectors obtained through the labor exchanges £1 a week and 50 per cent, of the takings. lie himself took £1 a week and 25 per cent, of the total sums collected. What is the remedy for this state of affairs? Several practicable suggestions have been made, one being that the police should decree that no singlo charity shall have permission to collect in the streets fo.r more thas one day in each year. Another proposal is that tho London County Council should be empowered to grant permission for street collecting only in response to a written application, accompanied by a report of the society concerned and ?, certificate of its truth."