The Dominion, in its coverage of student capping week activities, gave considerable prominence to certain student actions and chose to ignore completely various others.

This has led many students to believe that the Dominion is pursuing a policy of showing students to the community in a very poor light.

Whether or not the Dominion has such a deliberate policy has not been established, although we present some evidence tending to this conclusion.

There can be no doubt, however, that the Dominion, consciously or unconsciously, has inculcated in the minds of the public the idea that very little good ever comes of student actions.

Charity Collection

The failure of the Dominion to mention the efforts of over 140 students in collecting more than £1000 for charity is an example.

The charity collection, which took place on the last Thursday of the first term, raised £1050. This is 3½ times as much as Victoria students have ever collected before. Furthermore, that sum was in excess of the amount raised by the Plunket Society's recent street-day appeal. No one would question the public image of the Plunket Society!

One hundred and forty-two student collectors manned 59 collection posts downtown, most collectors being at their posts for 3½ hour at a time. A further 25 students, from Weir House and Vic. "B," collected between 7am and 9am at the Railway Station, and 30 additional collectors lent their services during the procession.

At the Town Hall the organising committee received full boxes from collectors, emptied boxes, counted and banked the money.

All in all, Thursday, May 6, was an important day, both for the city and for students. Accordingly, the Dominion was rung at 5.30pm and told of the total that had been collected.

The Dominion apparently showed little interest. Mrs. M. Muir, the President of the Wellington Senior Club, first rang the Dominion and was told by the telephone operator that the reporters had all gone home, and that the story would have to wait until the next day.

Mrs. Muir, realising the absurdity of this statement (the deadline for the first edition of the Dominion is around 10.30pm), insisted on being put through to a sub-editor.

This was done. Mrs. Muir gave the Dominion all the facts about the collection—the amount collected, the number of collectors involved, the purposes for which the money would be used. She also expressed the Wellington Senior Club's gratitude for the effort put in by students.

But, come Friday, there was no mention in the Dominion of the charity collection. Considerable front-page space was given to the attempt by Wellington students to drink dry the Foresters' Arms Hotel.

The same article also dealt with the alleged indecency of some of the floats in Auckland's procession. This article, featured that day on the Dominion's bill-board as Student Antics Under Fire, is analysed on page 2 of this issue.

On Friday afternoon the student charity collection organiser, Salient Co-Editor John Llewellyn, rang Mr. Reeves, the editor of the Dominion and told him that it seemed unfair to devote a lot of space to a student drinking episode and ignore a large scale student collection.

Mr. Reeves listened quietly, then put the call on to the Dominion's Chief Reporter, Mr. J. Kelliher.

Mr. Kelliher said that it was quite probable that the story had been set in type, and that it would be used in Saturday's edition.

An offer to repeat the details was declined. Mr. Kelliher was sure that the Dominion would have all the details it required.

However, he took down two phone numbers which he could obtain the information from.

On Saturday morning, the Dominion had found space in its letters column for an anti-student letter, which was given prominent display. No mention of any Wellington student activity appeared in the news columns.

On Monday, the story finally appeared—1½ column-inches at the middle of the paper where the news and classified adverts merge.

One member of the Senior Club wrote in expressing her annoyance that the Dominion should give prominence to the actions of some students and ignore the actions of others.

Five days after the collection, it was printed.

Flour Bombs

A second example is the Dominion's attitude to Procesh.

A warning was published in Salient that anyone throwing flour in Procesh was liable to be photographed.

No projectiles of any kind were thrown by students during Procesh.

However, students were subjected to mud, water, and plaster thrown from building sites and office buildings. One student was cornered by members of the public and soaked with water.

Even after Procesh itself, when the control Land-Rover was returning to the university, building workers threw wet cement at it.

The Dominion has in past years strongly attacked students when they have thrown objects at members of the public. The actions of the public this year were not reported. The behaviour of the students in Procesh rated one sentence which was deleted from the city edition.

Congratulations to:

Procesh students for their wit and self-control.

The Dominion, for lazy pettymindedness.

Charity collectors, for their work. The Evening Post, for its overall fairness.

Graduands, for being graduates.

Mr. Mitchison, of the Foresters' Arms, for getting his cheapest publicity yet.