LOCAL AND GENERAL

Wairarapa Times-Age, 13 November 1940, Page 4

LOCAL AND GENERAL

Interhouse Sports Day. Mr. Steve Sharman, Masterton, has donated a cup for the girls’ cycle race to be held in connection with the interhouse sports day on the King's birthday. November 25. 94-Year-Old Motorist. Producing the necessary medical certificate. a resident of Whangarei, aged 94, has secured his motor-driver’s license. This is the oldest male driver in the district, and no female driver is over 70. Church Parade. Members of the Masterton Rotary Club will attend service at St. Matthew's Church, Masterton, on Sunday morning. The club padre, the Ven. Archdeacon E. J. Rich, will be the preacher. Bridge Building Loan. At a meeting of the Masterton County Council yesterday afternoon a resolution authorising the raising of a special loan of £22,000 for rebuilding 11 bridges exceeding 20ft. in span within the county, was passed.

Waipawa By-Election. Absent voters entitled to vote in the Waipawa by-election are reminded that with the exception of the larger offices, Post Offices close at 12.30 p.m. on Saturday. All persons intending to record their votes at Post Offices as absent voters on Saturday next should accordingly do so in the morning. Lamb Competition.

Owing to petrol restrictions, labour shortage and shearing operations, the entries in the Meat Board’s district lamo competition show a decrease in those of last year. It is anticipated that some 20. pens will be judged at the Waingawa freezing works tomorrow morning.

Masterton Flower Show. The Masterton Horticultural Society’s Spring Flower Show will be held in the Municipal Hall on Wednesday, November 20. Entries will close on Tuesday. November 19. Schedules may be obtained from the secretary (Mr E. K. East wood).

Lay Readers’ Service. The first annual public service of the Wellington Lay Readers’ Association, formed recently by the Bishop of Wellington, will be held in St. Matthew’s Church this evening at 7.30 o’clock. All the clergy and lay readers of the Wairarapa will join in the service which will be choral. The preacher will be the Rev. K. F. Button, B.A.

Masterton Wrestler Successful. Sergeant W. Browne, of Masterton, and formerly of the local public hospital stafl'. won the welter weight wrestling title among the troops aboard the vessel in which he travelled to England. Pie also wrestled a draw with an English competitor in a tournament held in London in aid of the comforts for soldiers fund.

Presbyterian Church Assembly. The General Assembly Of the Presbyterian Church of New Zealand met in St. Andrew’s Church, Palmerston North last night. Public worship having been conducted by the retiring moderator, the Rt. Rev. J. Lawson Robinson, the Rev. G. H. Jupp. Anderson’s Bay. Dunedin, was unanimously elected moderator. A report of the Moderator’s address will be found on page 8.

Radio Receiving Licences. “At the end of September last,” states the Postmaster-General (the Hon. P. C. Webb), “a new peak was reached in paid radio receiving licences. the number being 350,285, which represents an increase of 17,959 licences or 5.4 per cent, over September of the previous year. It is interesting to note that in five years the number of licences has almost doubled, the increase being 174,992 or 99.8 per cent. The percentage of paid licences to the number of households is now 90.4 per cent.; and the number of such licences per hundred of population is 2.15.”

Stock Valuation Dispute. The union had been disputing with the Commissioner of Taxes over his action in requiring farmers whose land was under £3OOO unimproved value to alter their stock values, said the Dominion secretary of the New Zealand Farmers’ Union, Mr. A. P. O'Shea, in a statement yesterday. The commissioner. he said, was requiring these farmers in many cases to write up their values at the end of the year. The Farmers’ Union had had considerable correspondence with the commissioner, Mr. O'Shea said, but no satisfactory reply had been received to its last inquiry. It was, therefore, urging farmers in the meantime to use the same values for their opening and closing stock, preferably those values which they had previously been using.

The Termite Pest. When it was discovered last year that Australian termites (white ants) had become established in Auckland and New Plymouth, and that they were causing serious damage to buildings and attacking power-poles, the New Zealand Government requested the Australian Commonwealth Council for Scientific and Industrial Research to make an officer available to report on the situation and recommend measures for dealing with the problem that had arisen. In accordance with this request Mr. F. N. Ratcliffe, senior entomologist, visited the Dominion some time ago and spent five weeks in the country. In his report to the New Zealand Government, Mr. Ratcliffe states that the only way in which the spread of white ants in New Zealand I could be checked, and the established • infestation brought under control, would be by an organised campaign

of locating and poisoning colonies. War on Rabbits. The adoption of a plan involving the payment of a wages subsidy in connection with registered unemployed engaged on the destruction of rabbits was announced last evening by the Minister of Labour. Mr. Webb. The sche'.ie provides for local operation by rabbit boards, approved committees and individual farmers, the workers being paid at award rates and being selected from the registered unemployed except where experienced rabbiters are required as foremen or in specially difficult 1 high country. A subsidy of £3 10s. a man-week is to be payable from the funds provided for the promotion of employment. Launched on October 1 last, there are at present 251 men employed on a total of 347.000 acres—--27.000 in South Canterbury. 95.000 in the Queens town area. 221.000 in Otago Centra), and 4000 acres in other parts of Otago.