 Dodds engaged in a prolonged exchange of letters through the columns of the "Dartford Chronicle" through the autumn of 1949 over the Government's Control of Engagement Order, which allowed the Government to specify jobs for the unemployed in which they were required to work.Dodds pointed to the relatively small number of people who were directed, and invited Roberts to a public meeting at which he would tell her what had happened on Tyneside and Wearside between the wars (she declined due to prior engagements).They also clashed on family allowances.