COMMUNITY CALL

Wairarapa Times-Age, 23 March 1943, Page 2

COMMUNITY CALL

RESPONSE TO PATRIOTIC FUND GREATER EFFORT NEEDED. APPEAL BY THE MAYOR. “On the sixth of this month,” said the Mayor, Mr T. Jordan, who is also chairman of the District Patriotic Committee, “the local patriotic committee set out on its quest of the district’s quota for the Provincial Patriotic Fund—an amount in round figures of £20,000. The population of the district south of Eketahuna is roughly 25,000— 16s per head would do it. How havethey fared? “The published figures,” said Mr Jordan, “do little credit to the inhabitants of this rich and beautiful district. Before the committee opened its campaign, I tried the financial pulse and the generous instincts of the district, and I was ashamed of the response and tried to forget it. We do not deserve to win any war. “Within the last week,” Mr Jordan continued, “we have all read these glowing tributes to our New Zealand Division. Mr Winston Churchill says: ‘I have never seen a- finer body of troops.’ Colin Wells, the Australian: ‘No fighting unit in this war has gained for itself such laurels as has the New Zealand Division? “We have, unfortunately, more than 8,000 of the flower of our youth prisoners in the hands of the enemy,” said Mr Jordan. “We have in the Pacific a second division eager and striving to show its mettle in our defence. We have within the Dominion more than another division of young men of whom we have every reason to be proud. We have sick and wounded in many places, to whom the voice of humanity calls us. For all of these we are asked to make the provision of some additional comfort and even pleasure. Here is an opportunity to prove our faith, our interest and our gratitude. Are we really worth fighting for? “I have recently read the report of our Patriotic Commissioner in the Middle East, Colonel Waite,” said Mr Jordan, “in which he tells the story of the journey from the base to the New Zealand Division, then in full cry after Rommel’s army, of 21 three-ton lorries piled with Christmas parcels, and of the thrilling welcome that the parcels received. Is this district concerned with parcels for next Christmas? Or is it concerned with private envy and political selfishness? During the past 24 years I have said more than once that we in the Wairarapa are slow beginners, but desperate finishers. There is yet time to redeem ourselves. The campaign closes with the month. Let us see to it with a will that we are not shamed in this trial. Bravo, Pahiatua! They did their task and more in less than a week.”