LOCAL AND GENERAL

Wairarapa Times-Age, 25 February 1939, Page 4

LOCAL AND GENERAL

Two Grass Fires Yesterday. The Masterton Fire Brigade received two calls yesterday to grass fires in Renall Street and the Masterton Cemetery. Little damage was done in either case. It is thought that carelessly thrown lighted matches caused both outbreaks. Auckland A. & P. Show.

The forty-seventh annual metropolitan show of the Auckland Provincial A. and P. Association opened in brilliant weather yesterday. There are more than 2500 entries, beating last year’s record. The high standard of stock is reflected in the determination of primary producers to improve the quality of breeds. Industries in Taranaki.

The establishment of secondary industries in Taranaki was considered by a special meeting of business men in New Plymouth on Thursday night. After an address by Mr F. L. Frost, M.P., it was decided to ask the Taranaki Chamber of Commerce to investigate possibilities and confer with the Government.

Stock Inspector’s Death. Mr Donald Herne Gunn, aged 58, stock inspector to the Ashburton County, dropped dead at his home yesterday morning. He succeeded Mr J. W. Smith, who also dropped dead at a farmers’ meeting eighteen months ago. Mr Gunn was in the Department of Agriculture for seventeen years, coming to Ashburton from Otago. He leaves a wife and adult family. Fundamental Duty.

“Our fundamental duty is to see that we contribute in our time _ our quota to the protection of the liberties enjoyed in a democratic Empire and to see that our heritage is not infringed or jeopardised,” said the Minister of Public Works, the Hon R. Semple, in Kaitaia when urging the strengthening of the Empire defences. Married Women Teachers.

A decision to join with other education boards in protesting against the amendment to the Education Act giving married women teachers equal rights for appointments was made at a meeting of the Southland Education Board yesterday. The motion embodied a request that the former system providing boards with discretionary power in the appointment of married women teachers be reverted to.

Church Thanksgiving. The Methodist Church of New Zealand will endeavour to raise a Centennial thanksgiving fund of not less than £150,000 during 1940. The proposal was introduced by the president-elect, the Rev L. B. Neale, at the annual conference of the church in Christchurch yesterday, and was received with enthusiastic approval. After discussion it was referred to the Home Missions Board, which was authorised to set up special committees in each district.

Cable Car Accident. An elderly woman received injuries necessitating her removal to hospital, and other passengers bruises and a shaking when the Mornington (Dunedin) cable car collided with a stationary trailer at the tram terminus. The car was reaching its destination from the city when a “bunch” developed in the rope behind the gripper. The gripman was unable to check the car’s progress in time to prevent its striking the trailer, which was pushed off the line across a turntable to come to rest against the kerb outside a shop. Mary White was bumped off the tram, receiving injuries to the head and face and abrasions. Waterfront Problems. The proposed conference at which all phases of waterfront work .in New Zealand are to be discussed will open, according to tentative arrangements, in Wellington on Thursday week. In making this announcement yesterday, the Minister of Labour, the Hon. P. C. Webb, said he had arranged for the Under-Secretary of Labour to get into touch with shipping companies, waterside and labour organisations, and all other parties vitally interested. If other conferences were necessary later they would be held. Mr Webb said it was his intention to be present at the conference till such time as it arranged its own method of transacting business. Application for Maintenance. “I am not going to look kindly on the application for maintenance by a young woman of 24 when there is plenty of work, even if she is not willing to give wifely services or has been driven out of home,” said Mr Justice Ostler in the Supreme Court at Napier yesterday during the hearing of a divorce action. The husband sought divorce on the grounds of desertion and the wife prayed for rejection of the application and the granting of the divorce to her. After a brief consultation the parties announced that the defence had been withdrawn and a decree nisi was granted the husband.

Building Destroyed by Fire. Flames which threw skyward great masses of smoke and burning embers destroyed a large two-storey wooden building owned by Browne Bros, and Geddes, Ltd., confectionery manufacturers, Newmarket, Auckland, at daybreak yesterday. Though a portion of the framework was saved, the building is regarded as a complete loss and will have to be rebuilt. Fire brigades did good work in preventing the spread of the flames to the company’s main store and manufacturing premises. The block destroyed was insured for £lOOO and the contents for £lBOO. The loss over and above insurances’s erZmatecl at £2OOO. Nearoy residents for a time were concerned about danger . from falling embers, but this was of brief duration. Cheese Pay-out. “After a careful consideration of the facts I consider that the Government is not justified in making a further payment for butterfat for cheese manufacture for the 1937-38 season, said the Minister of Marketing, the Hon W. Nash, in a statement in connection with the price differential of cheese over butter, released by Mr Hale, chairman of the Dairy Board, at a conference of No. 1 ward of the Dairy Board in Morrinsville. Asked in Wellington by Mr Hale if the further payment procedure for 1936-37 would be repeated in respect of 1937-38, the Minister replied that the circumstances relating to the cheese pay-out for 1937-38 were different from those of 1936-37, and therefore no additional payment for the 1937-38 season’s cheese would be made.