W.E.A. GROUP

Wairarapa Times-Age, 14 October 1943, Page 3

W.E.A. GROUP

SOCIAL DEVELOPMENT IN RUSSIA The intensive mechanisation of the Soviet Union and the provision by Russian trade unions of cultural amenities were discussed by the Masterton W.E.A. group at its last meeting. The 96,000 clubs which functioned in Russia in 1939, it was stated, catered for every type of activity—sport, music, art, drama and popular science. Reference was made to the disappearance of several musical societies that once functioned in Masterton, to the influence of the cinema and wireless on' public taste, to the Little Theatre movement and to the question of handicrafts in a machine age. The part played by youth in the Soviet Union was clearly demonstrated, it | was said, by the fact that more than one quarter of the deputies of the Supreme Soviet are under 30 years of age; and some are under 20. The part played by women is indicated in the fact that half of the 132,000 doctors in Russia are women. With this emergence of women into industries and the professions, it was inevitable that the care of children should become specialised. Until the age of 3> they are under the care of the Soviet Department of Public Health which maintains regular nurseries where the child is under the supervision of trained nurses and doctors. Children over that age go to kindergartens.