UNNECESSARY RAILWAYS.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXXII, Issue 3168, 20 April 1909, Page 4

UNNECESSARY RAILWAYS.

There is far too general a tendency to subordinate the public interests of the whole country to purely local considerations and to the necessity for securing votes. It is nothing less than scandalous that at a time when Government find it necessary to retrench and economise on every hand, says the Auckland "Star," claims such as those made on behalf of the Lawrence-Roxburgh Railway should be bolstered up by local agitations, and the State Treasury should be thus shamelessly plundered to satisfy selfish, parochial prejudices and imaginary needs. We hope that the Government will not be content with what they have done in this case, but that they will carefully investigate the conditions under which all our railways are being constructed, and will ruthlessly strike out all projects which do not appear to be immediately required in the public interest.

SERVANT GIRL PROBLEM. Miss Bremner, in charge of the Women's Labour Bureau, reports in the "Labour Journal" as follows: "It is apparently next to impossible to get maids to go into the country. The position is very serious for women with young families who require help urgently. Maids are also showing a strong disinclination to engage in private service, preferring public places or institutions where the work is more defined, the hours shorter and more liberty given in the way of holidays and time off. It must not be assumed," Miss Bremner continues, "that the demands on servants in private service are at all unreasonable, as in the majority of homes a weekly half-holiday is given, with generous pay and most of the evenings off. The tendency is towards an improvement of the conditions under which the domestic works. Good places are always available for the right class of girls."