LOCAL AND GENERAL

Wairarapa Times-Age, 7 May 1940, Page 4

LOCAL AND GENERAL

Parting Gift From Maoris.

The Governor-General, Lord Galway, has consented to meet a deputation of Waikato Maori chiefs at Government House, Auckland, probably this month. The purpose is to present to his Excellency a waka-huia (feather box) as a parting gift. It will contain a loyal address from King Koroki. on behalf of Waikato and associated tribes, which, It is hoped, his Excellency will present to the King on his return to England. The invitation to meet the chiefs was extended to Lord Galway by Princess Te Puea Herangi. A True Bill Returned.

The grana jury in the Wellington Supremo Court yesterday returned a true bill against Kenneth Stanley Clement, of Mauriceville, who is charged with alleged assault causing actual bodily harm, and alleged assault with intent to do grievous bodily harm. War Expenses Fund.

Additional interest-free loans and donations for war purposes, bringing the total received up to £1.806,199, were acknowledged yesterday by the Minister of Finance. Mr Nash. Included in the amount is a monthly donation of £1 4s from the staff of the Pahiatua Public Hospital. Drunken Motorist Sent to Gaol. A sentence of one month’s imprisonment with hard labour was imposed on Aden Harry August Pearson, mechanic, aged 30. when he appeared before Mr Stout, S.M., in the Magistrate’s Court, Wellington, yesterday, charged with having been intoxicated while in charge of a car in Featherston Street. The magistrate ordered that his licence be cancelled and that he be prohibited from obtaining another for five years.

Examination of Plumbers. A recommendation that the Plumbers’ Board be urged to hold two examinations for registration each year, and to allow apprentices to enter for the practical examination after five years’ experience instead of five years and a half, these arrangements to operate for the duration of the war, was adopted by the Christchurch- Technical College Board of Governors. At present the examinations are held only once a year, and the experience required is five years and a half. The alterations would enable a number of apprentices to qualify for registration before going on active service, it was explained. Competitors of Reading. That books nowadays faced the fiercest competition in the history of the printed word since the dark ages was claimed by Mr A. T. Donnelly in his address at the Canterbury University College Degree Day ceremony. Part of this competition, he said, came from the nervous strains and stresses of the times, and in particular it came from the radio and the cinema. “The radio and the cinema have many merits, but there are defects, they march on, they flow over the watcher or listener, they pass him by, they leave him as he was,” said Mr Donnelly: “They stand for the triumph of the law of least effort.” Exhibition Panels. It has now been definitely decided that the fine panelling in the Canterbury Court of the Centennial Exhibition buildings at Wellington will be transferred to Christchurch and placed round the walls of the committee room in the Christchurch City Council chambers in which the Canterbury Court executive always met. These panels, built of New Zealand native woods, interspersed with enlarged photographs of scenes in Canterbury, have been one of the major attractions of the exhibition, thousands of people from all over the Dominion having shown their appreciation of the unusual display. It is also intended to endeavour to preserve for the city the fine Hamner marble blocks used in the Canterbury Court.

Rongotai Plane Factory. The new de Havilland aeroplane factory at Rongotai will be producing planes by the end of this month, when the first batch of Tiger Moth training machines ordered by the New Zealand Government will be put into service. It is proposed for the time being tc produce machines at the rate of six a month, said Mr P. J. de Havilland, of Aircraft Corporation, London, who arrived at Auckland yesterday. He added that since the decision was made 12 months ago to establish a factory in New Zealand progress had been excellent. In its early stages the factory would be principally an assembly plant, planes being received from England and assembled at Wellington, with the exception of woodwork and certain small parts manufactured in New Zealand. As the plant became available and the staff was trained, more of the parts would be fabricated in the Dominion, and ultimately the entire machines .would be New Zea-land-built. New Freedom in Schools. “Some three years ago the primary schools of this country were freed from external examinations of any kind,” said the president, Mr D. C. Pryor, in his address at the annual conference of the New Zealand Educational Institute in Wellington yesterday. “As a result we have been able to introduce into our schools a freedom which was not before possible—to bring the curriculum in our schools more closely in touch with' the daily lives of the pupils. I sincerely believe that this has resulted in a wonderful uplift in the work of our teachers and of the product of our schools. Teachers all over the country have been able to introduce into their classrooms methods of instruction and revisions of curriculum which have meant in many cases a completely new outlook on methods and objectives of the work in the school. It was to be expected that such a change, amounting in many cases almost to a revolution, should have led to mistakes being made. Some teachers have perhaps been over en-thusiastic-others over conservative. But we have now reached a stage where a happy medium has been attained, and I venture to say that the elimination of the proficiency certificate has resulted in a tremendous improvement in the work of our schools.