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"AS OTHERS SEE US." I

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"AS OTHERS SEE US." I HAVERFORDWEST DISTRICT COUN- CIL SHARPLY CRITICISED. "A DISGRACE TO PEMBROKESHIRE." Under the beading The Li^ht of Pembrokeshire, the South Wales Daily News'' sharply v :sharply criticises the Haverfordwest Rural District Council. It savs:- We wish the Haverfordwest Rural District Council could see itself as others see it. Replying to criticisms which its neglect has provoked, 3Ir W. George James declared at the last meeting that he had been told only that morning bv a highly- respected local gentleman that no public body in Pembrokeshire performed its duties in a more straightforward and effective manner. If that state- ment is true, local government in Pembrokeshire must be a bigger farce than even its severest critics have imagined. Let us examine the statement in the light of the Council's recent record. It is only a few months since this Haverfordwest authority, which has jurisdiction over nearly two-thirds of the county, put into force the Housing Act of 190i). For nearly four years the Act was a dead letter, and it would Inve been so to-day if the Local Government Board had not threatened pains and penalties. This neglect of public duties was not due to ignorance. It was wanton and deliberate, despite the fact that there 'a.re 'in the Council's area some of the worst hovels in Wales. Consider next how the Council treats its employees. Until we exposed it in these columns, and denounced its inhumanity, this model employer was paying its labourers a bare 1.)3 a week, and many of them even less. After months of shuttling and equivocation it decided to raise the wages slightly, but if all the increases then promised had been granted the labourers would still be miserably sweated and underpaid. Everybody thought the increases were now being paid, but it leaked out at the last meeting that the resolution to raise the wages, though passed some months ago, will not take effect till next April. In heaven's name, why ? Is this an example of effective and straightforward performance of duties ? The Council might also have assisted in the work of repairing the road to Hook, but it shilly-shallied iintil the plucky women of that village held it up to shame and contempt by doing the work themselves. Asain, it might have had the humanity to allow its sweated labourers a weekly half holiday, considering that for nine months of the year they work eleven hours a day, and nine hours a day in the three remaining months, hut when two members—the Rev. H. Evans and Mr W. Evans-put forward the suggestion they were shouted down with loud cries of -NO." The recent record of the Council is a disgrace to Pembrokeshire. In place of efficiency and straightforwardness there has been gross neglect, callous indifference, and shuffling and dodging of every urgent issue. But of an enlightened conception of public duty and zeal for the improve- ment of local conditions there is no trace in the Council's recent record. Nor will there be any radical change until the body is reconstituted or the County Council takes it firmly in hand.

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