WOMEN'S WAR WORK.

Taranaki Daily News, 12 July 1917, Page 7

WOMEN'S WAR WORK.

REPLACING INELIGIBLES. The necessity for women doing more work than at present) in order to release men for active servico 'was strongly urged by Captain Walker, military representative of the Defence Department, at yesterday's Bitting of the First Wellington Military Service Board in New Plymouth. He cross-examined several of the appellants as to the ability of their female relatives to undertake various classes of farm work, the point he emphasised being that while women might not be able to do eome kinds of work they might relieve men ineligible for active service from other kinds of labor, so that they could take up the duties of the eligible men, the latter thus becoming available for service. "The time has come," said Captain Walker in the course of a conversation with a News' reporter, "when the women of New Zealand should realise that they must do more of the work ordinarily done by men than they are doing at present, or, as I said before the Board, married men will have to go leaving their wives and families behind. The board has often to deal with statements to the effect that there must, be men on certain places, men to do heavy work or other work unsuitable for women, but surely it does not follow that these men must be of the class eligible for military service. In many, or perhaps in most cases, their places might be taken by men ineligible for service but quite capable of doing the work, but at present employed in occupations such as milking, which can easily be done. As to what women can do just look at this book, entitled 'Women's War Work,' and issued by the 'British War Office. Here is a photograph of a pork butcher's shop, the business being run by the wife and two daughters who, with the help of two girl assistants, kill and dress between six and eight pigs per week. Here are other photographs showing 'Women engaged in driving delivery vans, cleaning locomotives, stoking in a factory, loading coal in trucks, ploughing, harrowing, and so on, and I have one of a girl of 14 who has already become quite competent in various classes of agricultural work. Perhaps the following quotation from this volume will be of interest as putting the exact position from tho British; War Office point of view:— 'Women of Great Britain and employers of labor, remember that (a) No man who is eligible for military service should be retained in civil employment if his place can bo temporarily filled by a woman or by a man who is ineligible for military service.' (2) No man who is ineligible for military service should be retained on work which can be performed by a woman (for the duration of the war) if the man himself can be utilised to release another who is eligible for military service and who cannot be satisfactorily replaced by a woman.' "Yes," concluded Captain Walker, "our 'women in New Zealand must do more than they are doing, or our married men must go."