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Terrible Exposures of Imposition.

RECIPIENTS OF " CHARITY* IN AUCKLAND. The N.Z. Herald is making some revelations as to the dispensation of “ charitable ” aid in Auckland, According to our contemporary two or three members of the Board sit in turn weekly, and give up their time and their business from 3 o’clock in the afternoon till sometimes 7 o’clock in the evening, to be bounced and abused, for the most part, by the stream of drunken, improvident, loafing, and dissolute humanity which surges into the corridors of the Board’s offices once a week. Of course there is a residuum of honest poverty arising from sickness and unavoidable misfortune, but it is a mere drop in tbs bucket when contrasted with the stream of imposition and mendicancy there to be seen. The members of the Board appear themselves to despair of getting rid of the profen sionaf pauper class, which our charitable system has created, and surrender at disore tion to the more case-hardened to get rid of them. A few of the cases may be taken as typical, and they bring out the seamy side of human nature:—

No. 1, application for rations. The “ des titute ” family were reported as keeping a sleek bulldog, who, it was cynically remarked, was probably thriving on the Board’s rations. No. 2 was amusing, as showing that human nature is pretty much the same in the breast of a well-to-do landlord, as in that of a sturdy beggar at the Charitable Aid Board. So long as recipient of charity was his tenant, the landlord reported that the applicant was " a'most deserving case,” but when she left to get another house, he expressed his belief that she was undeserving of aid I No. 3 was a case in which the father had succeeded in getting rid of his children in the Industrial School, and now wanted the Bo ard to “ take him in,” and finish the job, No. 4 had bean assisted by some benevolent people who jhad subscribed £lO to purchase him a trap, and £lO more waa in hand. He got rations till the trap was built for him, No, S, young woman, two illegitimate children, <• wanted rations.” On being asked who the fathers were, she replied jauntily, she did not know, but perhaps the Board or its inspecting officer did I Could not get work, She got rations, No. 6, fifteen years out of twenty years in gaol, a string of convictions, drunkenmss, Suffering from an accident, got somehow, Rations accorded, No, 7, had a long record in connection with the worst side of city lite. Broken down in body, unfit tor work. He is to be now taken care of for life. No, s, applied to the Board, but whst for could not clearly be made out, as ha was living at the PrinoeeS-street Receiving Home, at the expense of the Board. It was supposed the applicant had got mixed up in his charities and was giving the wrong institution “ a oall."

No S was an amusing ease. The applicant was a fine stalwart-looking navvy. “ Could get no work | wanted rations,” It was stated he had shipped for the West Coast coal mines, having his passage paid for him. On getting there, the strikers paid him to clear out again. He returned to AuokUnd, to his home, to the Board, and to rations. The inspecting officer, Mr Strathern, observed, “Why do you spend your time in the Police Court of a morning, hearing the cases, instead of looking for work 5” “ Oh, Mr Strathern, how can you say so,” replied the anplicant, ■’ Gentlemen of tnc Board, I’ll tell' yog the God’s truth, I've only been at the Court three times this week, and this is Thursday I” The members o' the Board roared again at the man being convicted out of his own mou'h, and the joke put them ip such good humor that though giving him ap order for etone-breaking, they granted a week’s rations, so as to be able to break the tidings gently to his family that he would at last have to work—things had come to that 1 This Rip Van Winkle seemed to he well mated, for it was officially reported that the good lady’s principal virtue waa that she was ” a good coloniser.” No. 10, was a fino stalwart woman, who turns up month after month with the regularity of the town clock, for rations. The husband has left the colony. No. 11. ditto. Is willing to keep herself, or to keep her children, if the Board will find the work, or pay her to do so, but decidedly objects to work her fingers ends off for youngsters. No. 12, single, cams m dressed ratner above the average, and with all the comforts of middle class life apparent. The Board thought she had made a mistake and got into the wrong building, and inquired as to her business She replied, smilingly, Well, I can’t get work. I'm willing to go as a nurse in the Hospital, or in ths Asylum, or the Gao), J want rations.” The Relieving Officer said, “ This is a woman to whom I gave an order yesterday for a situation at 8s a week, and she threw the order in my face.” The chairman asked how that came abou-. ‘Wei-, saiq the lady, smirking, “ Do you know s where he wished me to go te. keep mouse—to a chimney Gh» no - , poi that l’ ! Ths R-Jieviti’ Officer retorted, “If the man was blaofc his -money -was white, Heyeiipon several tfiamb^vs--ox- the Board testified to having kridwti ’sweeps- who. were highly-respected and esteemea-fellPW-citizenp. They intimated that they wOnl'l tee-ffier St a more convenient ssas-mj simpering and giggling the lady elippdd into the corridor laughing at the idea that she should be asked to keep house for a chimney sweep. To take rations as a pauper might ha ’endured, hut beneath the deep there was a <Mp—-he chimney sweep, The abjv 0 cases are a pretty fair sample of tua whole number. Analysing the 36 oases, one-half were stated to be referable to drink, directly or indirectly; one-fourth to pure laziness and improvidence; while even in the other fourth, where the present distress was unavoidable and unforeseen, the applicants did not to have made the slightest effort in the years gons by to provide for a rainy day. Of the whole batch of f-rnale applicants not one appeared to be what could be called "poorly” clad—in fact, all were comfortably, and some well dressed, and provided with every accessory, Roughly speaking, the quiet, a-jfering poor were nnt tkera; and the moral of the afternoon's sitting was that every ration granted to “frauds” was so much of which the deservIng poor were bereft. What is needed is that the really deserving should receive the charity awaiting them, and which they may rightly and justly claim, and that the drunkard, the loafer, and the criminal should be brushed aside without compunction on the highest authority that man can have, “ He that will not work, neither shall he eat.” The Rev. J. S. Hill remained throughout the sitting of the Board taking notes of the oases. He said he was simply appalled at the mass of mendicancy and imposition before th® Board ; the number of eases refer, able to intemperance, and ths brazen-teoed impudence with which the Id's, the vagrant, and the dissolute applied for rations as of right;. The overlapping of charities and want of co operation In these organisations, In checking imposition, also attracted bls attention, He was fully satisfied from personal Observation that the statements In the papers az to the abuse of official charity were rather below than above the. mark. The rev. gentleman evidently believes in a labor test, where practicable, for a large class of the applicants, as he said he would recommend the Government to Import a quantity of oakum I Nothing arrested his attention so much as the iyell-dreasad appearance of the females, some of whom he remarked were better attired than the members of his own family.

Permanent link to this item
Hononga pūmau ki tēnei tūemi

https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/GSCCG18890713.2.23

Bibliographic details
Ngā taipitopito pukapuka

Gisborne Standard and Cook County Gazette, Volume III, Issue 324, 13 July 1889, Page 3

Word count
Tapeke kupu
1,349

Terrible Exposures of Imposition. Gisborne Standard and Cook County Gazette, Volume III, Issue 324, 13 July 1889, Page 3

Terrible Exposures of Imposition. Gisborne Standard and Cook County Gazette, Volume III, Issue 324, 13 July 1889, Page 3

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