PHYSICAL WELFARE

Te Ao Hou, September 1955, Page 53

PHYSICAL WELFARE There is a great social, as well as sports value in the work being done by the East Coast people through properly organised sports clubs. The East Coast is one of the few areas where the Physical Welfare branch of the Internal Affairs Department is still operating, and I think the results being obtained there can be put down largely to the energy and drive of Mr J. R. Sheffield the Physical Welfare Officer. Under his guidance and with the benefit of his enthusiasm and wide experience, the East Coast Maoris have formed some sixty indoor sports bodies, often in places where no such thing existed before. The clubs are conducted and administered by local committees, and although games are not an ultimate goal in useful citizenship, the effects of healthy recreation are an important ingredient of it. An example of the work being done may be seen in the East Coast Badminton Association, which is composed of nine clubs with no fewer than four hundred members. I doubt whether there are four hundred regular badminton players in Wellington. It is very pleasing to see that although the Physical Welfare branch is being cut down, its remaining field officers are each still showing the enthusiasm and are achieving results individually on the same scale as they did previously. I have long held the view that many of the social ills besetting some of our people—excessive drinking, etc.—could be overcome if more attention were given to organising healthy sports and recreation. Too often do they turn to the hotels for companionship simply because there is nowhere else to go. The Maori is gregarious by nature. He likes company. He has a cultural heritage of communal living. Because he is not used to being alone, I see in these sports clubs an ideal way of providing diversion through healthy and useful occupation of his leisure time.