A CRUEL PROVISION.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXXI, Issue 9050, 27 March 1908, Page 4

A CRUEL PROVISION.

To bring a deaf-mute under the Imbecile Passenger Act simply because he is a deaf-mute is a want of discrimination on the part of the framers of the law which can only be characterised as cruel. Some time ago a deaf-mute resident in New South Wales accepted a situation as a slaughterman in the dominion at a weekly wage of £5, but was refused admission because the Act referred to provided that if the Collector of Customs shall certify that any passenger has arrived in New Zealand on board any ship, "either lunatic, idiotic, deaf, dumb, blind or infirm, and likely in his opinion to be a charge," eti\, the shipping company is held liable for a bond of £IOO. The fear of consequences deters shipping companies from accepting deaf-mute passengers. The Australasian Deaf and Dumb Association ha« sent a petition of protest against the exclusion of intelligent deaf-mutes from the dominion. Jt is pointed out amongst other things that the deaf and dumb people naturally resent being classed with lunatics, idiots, and undesirables—as well they might. The late Premier, before whom the matter was brought, promised to have the law amended, but his untimely death prevented action being taken. It is to be huped the present Premier will lose no time in lemoving the slur f which the Imbecilfi Passenger Act | has placed upon an unfortunate but

generally, intelligent body of men and women, who are qualified to make very desirable citizens.

The Magistrate at Dannevirke, yesterday, decided that he who lights a fire for bush-clearing purposes and fails to prevent it from spreading to his neighbour's holding must be responsbile for damages. For a failure of this kind he has given judgment against a Weber farmer for £IOO. We are pleased to note that the Magistrate holds with the view we have more than once expressed recently that there should be tegal regulation in the matter of fire-light-ing. This is all the more necessary because in many instances bush settlers under the Crown are compelled to ilear the bush, and burning is the only practical way,of doing so.

The demoralising possibilities under the present system of haphazard charity in London were described by Mr John Burns in the House of Commons last month. He himself, he said, as a Cabinet Minister with £2,000 a year had pulled down his bowler, put up his collar, assumed the figure of slouching wretchedness, joined the forlorn queue of casuals on the Embankment, and received his quart of soup and pound of bread with the rest, simply by holding out has hand. Practically the same thing can be done in this dominion, as any one knows who has had the opportunity of observing what occurs in connection with the distribution of charitable aid by benevolent Institutions and kindred societies.