Low wages 'causing morals breakdown'

Families in squatter settlements around Port Moresby are so near poverty that the menfolk are sending their wives and sometimes elder daughters to work as prostitutes to increase the family income.

This allegation was made by the Papua New Guinea Teachers Association in a submission to the Minimum Urban Wages Board which is holding an inquiry into urban wages.

The association said the present minimum wage of $l5 a week had caused a breakdown in morality in the settlement area which contains around 10,000 squatters living in slum conditions.

The allegation that prostitution was widespread was supported by Mrs A. Orembo, a teacher, who said that many families could not afford sufficient food and clothing. Prostitution was a means of supplementing the present minimum wage of $l5. Some men also went out gambling in an effort to get more money. There was a high rate of absenteeism among schoolchildren, many of whom had no clothes to wear to school or were too ashamed to go to school in rags.

The Council of Trade Unions is seeking an increase in the minimum wage from $l5 a week to $42 over the next two years.

The Port Moresby R. C. Diocese said in its submission that the minimum urban wage should be raised to $26.40, and if a lower wage was set it should be tax free.

A minimum wage of $26.40 could be regarded as a just wage for a couple with three children.

On the request by the Council of Trade Unions for an increase to $42, the Finance Department told the Wages Board that a $4O a week urban wage would lead to a substantial drop in private enterprise employment, as em ployers sought to cut their wages bill by retrenching among the lower-paid staff. To take the minimum wage to $2O a week would not really affect public servants, assuming the PSA did not take such an increase as a reason for seeking relativity adjustment. Higher increases, however, would lead to de mands for adjustment.