Wairarapa Times-Age THURSDAY, AUGUST 6. 1942. NEEDS THAT MUST BE MET.

Wairarapa Times-Age, 6 August 1942, Page 2

Wairarapa Times-Age THURSDAY, AUGUST 6. 1942. NEEDS THAT MUST BE MET.

ADDRESSES made of late hi support of the all-purposes patriotic appeal—an appeal to which the response has been unequal in different parts of the Dominion—have emphasised particularly the needs of soldiers who are sick, wounded or prisoners of war. For example, Sir James Elliott, speaking the other evening as chairman of the Joint Conned o the Order of St John and the Red Cross Society, which is the agent o the National Patriotic Fund Board in service to sick, wounded and captive soldiers, said:

Our funds are now low and we need the help of everyone for those of whom it has been written: “At the going down of the sun and in the morning we will remember them.”

I-laviim added an assurance that not a penny of the money contributed by the public had been subject to Government control or interference, or spent in any way other than the purpose for which it was given, Sir James went on to state;—

Your donations have helped the suffering Poles, the Greeks, the Czechs and other cruelly oppressed people, and the stricken m Malta You have helped the seamen in both the Royal and the Merchant Navies and the survivors of the battles of the air. Our New Zealand Red Cross Commissioner, sees that every New Zealand hospital has Red Cross supplies, and well over 6,000 New Zealand prisoners of war have, at the sole cost of the people of New Zealand, received food every week to save them from hunger, sickness, or perhaps death itself.

To a great many people it may appear to matter not at all whether money provided for these admirable purposes, and particularly in making very necessary provision for members of the New Zealand fighting forces who are sick, wounded or prisoners of war, is or is not subject to “Government control or interference. ’ ’ What does matter is that these services should be .maintained, and how can that be accomplished and ensured better than by making them a national responsibility and a national charge on the resources of the people of Netv Zealand?

The strongest argument in favour of the raising of patriotic funds is that in this way help is given which is well merited, but could not well be given under any regimented scheme of* State action. There are some particulars to which this argument has a valid application, but can it be held to apply to the provision of Red Cross supplies for military hospitals or to the sending of food parcels to prisoners of war? These are services to all appearance admirably organised, and standardised, by the organisation which has undertaken to carry them out. Certainly, too, they are most necessary services. Why, then, should they not be financed by the State, or rather, is there any possible excuse for not having them financed by the State?

It has to be recognised that the response to the all-purposes patriotic appeal is lagging in some parts of the Dominion, including its capital city, where almost violent methods of overcoming the difficulties thus occasioned have lately been discussed. On the other hand it is safe to say that not a single voice that mattered would be raised in New Zealand against the financing by the State o£ the services rendered through the agency of the Order of St.John and the Red Cross Society to members of our fighting forces who are sick, wounded, or prisoners of Avar.

The policy of making an all-purposes patriotic appeal may be open to question. There is something to be said for the view that it would be better to make appeals for definite objects, specifically defined. In any event, no apology need be made for singling out the service rendered to sick, wounded and captive members of our fighting forces as one that must be maintained, and in regard to which there should be no more need for a patriotic appeal than there is for a similar appeal to meet the l cost of Aveapons, ships and planes.