SCARCITY OF LABOUR.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXXI, Issue 9136, 11 July 1908, Page 4

SCARCITY OF LABOUR.

The annual report of the Labour Department which was presented to Parliamtnt, yesterday, contained some interesting information with regard to the scarcity of labour in the Dominion. "It will be noticed," states tne report, "th.it the comparative percentage of females employed has decreased, and cnat. although more than double the number of women and girls are now employed compared with those for 1896, the ratio of employment of females to that of the males, has steadily decreased. This is racially a matter of congratulation, since," in my opinion, th-> less the future Viive& and mothers of the nation have to encounter industrial toil and enter into industrial competition with men the better. Economically, however, and accepting the necessity of work being carried on as at present, tie position is serious. So far as I have be«n able to gain information, there is a real dearth of effective manual labour, but what is far mora important, the Dominion itself will supply less and less for some considerable tirn?. Tnis is owing to the low birth-rate and to t ,e absence of any labou • jeserve that can reinforce the depleted ranks of the worker*) as time re'rroves them one by one through sickness, age, death, or (in thy case of women) by marriage. The birth-rate fell from 41.32 per thousand in 1876-80 to only 27.08 per thousand in 1906. If we take the case of girls of suitable age to work in factories we find that in New Zealand between the years 1891-96 there was an increase of 21.62 per cent, in the number of girls between fifteen and twenty-one years of age. In the next five years the increase had fallen to 6.77 per cent., and in the five years ending 1906 the rate of in crease further fell to 1.26 per cent. In regard to still younger girls —»; hose between five and ton years of aje—the further wait of reserve power for our labour supply is apparent. The figures regarding the boys are very much on thj same lines as of their sisters. Such figures, as the result of twenty years' national growth, are absolutely startling to those who have to take prevision for tha welfare of the people generally. The ditticiulty may not be evaded or shirked. Either our industries, instead of expanding, must shrink and disappear, or workers to carry on those industries must be found. That there are few and fewer recruits available from among the children of the Dominion will appear certain as time goe3 on, and even if there could be a remarkable filling-up of cradles from this j

moment onwards, it would still take years to close trie present vacant spaces in the thin ranks of our children who are now between five and fifteen years of age."