TE ORANGA HOME.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXXI, Issue 9039, 4 March 1908, Page 5

TE ORANGA HOME.

A COMMISSION OF ENQUIRY. BY TSLECiKArH —I'KKSS ASSOCIATION* CHRISTCHURCH, March 2. Mr W. H. Bishop, S.M., sat today as a Commission of Enquiry into the management of the Te Oranga Home. The order of reference enjoins enquiry into the management of the home and treatment of the inmates during the last two years in regard to the following matters: —(a) The suitability and effioacy of the methods adopted in the said school for the classification of the inmates in sections or orders for reformatory treatment. (b) The general treatment of the inmates, particularly as regards the methods of punishment, having regard to humanity on the one hand and the maintenance of proper discipline on the other, and any special treatment as regards punishment to which any particular inmate may have been subjected, (c) The duties of the members cf the staff, and whether or not such duties and the conditions under which they are performed entail any undue hardship. (d) The relations between the manager and the staff of attendants under her control, and the discretion or otherwise exercised by the manager in respect of her dealings with such attendants. One girl witness said she had been kept at wood chopping, but would have preferred housework, as not knowing housework mistresses had to teach the girls when they went to service. She had been twice flogged —on"e by the matron, who gave her twelve strokes, and once by Miss Mills, who gave her six sirokes. The first punishment was inflicted while witness was lying on a bed in her nightgown. Miss Mills, however, laid her on the floor without a mattress.

Another witness gave similar evidence. CHRISTCHURCH, March 3. The Tc Oranga Home enquiry was continued to-day. The witness who had concluded her evidence-in-chief yesterday wsis crossexareined. She said her complaints generally were not against the matron, but against the way they had to "slog in" at work. She wanted to do housework instead of wood-chopping. She did not know of a plot among the girls *:o abscond. In the winter of last year food was short, but she never made complaints. She had been punished for threatening to kill a girl. She did not got on well with all the members of the staff. They were too fond of growlinn; at her. Her punishment was inflicted with the broad side of a strap. The girl lay on a bed and was punished through her nightgown. The matron had boxed her ears. That caused a buzzing in her ears, but she was not exactly deaf. Another witness, the girl whose hair had been cut for escaping, said that she did not ask the other girls, to go to a house of ill-fame. The matron thumped her down tnj passage when she was brought back, and put her into a cell. She had three meals a day of dry bread and water, and ten strokes with ths strap. She had heard the matron make remarks about the girls. She called one cf the girls an infuriated animal, and another a vulgar brawler. The staff was very snappy to the girls, and not always very nice to them. The enquiry was adjourned till tomorrow.