HELPING EX-SOLDIERS

Dominion, Volume 14, Issue 122, 16 February 1921, Page 7

HELPING EX-SOLDIERS

AVAR RELIEF ASSOCIATION

The annual meeting of the AVar Relief Association of Wellington will be held on Wednesday afternoon next.. The annual report to be presented states that during the year, a "Disablement Committee" was set up to formulate a method whereby assistance could be granted most efficiently to a large number of partly and totally-disabled men. The scheme, which received hearty support, was adopted by the executive and Finance Committee bv whose authority the sum of £40,000— representing nearly 75 per cent, of tho total funds, has been lodged with the Public Trustee, constituting a separate investment, and designated as Fund "A,” which, in accordance with the intention of those whom the donors of the funds intended primarily to benefit, can te drawn upon only by partly and totally-disabled men, of whom there are more than 500 in tho district covered by the operations of tho association; and by those men who suffer a breakdown in health consequent upon an incipient?. but previously 'unuianifested war disability. Provision to meet all other cases of disability has been made by establishment of Fund “B”— which comprises the balance of the financial resources of the association. . . . "The Applications Committee” (states tho report) “has paid tradesmen’s accounts of every description; has also supplied baby clothes, paid maternity and funeral expenses; and has awarded grants supplementary to pensions in cases when the sums grouted by the Pensions Board aro insufficient for the soldier to maintain himself and' his family in pre-war standard of comfort. In certain circumstances grants to soldiers proceeding to employment and also union fees have been paid, orders issued for board and lodging, and for tools of trade; upon whom repayment of a loan for the latter purpose, if awarded by the Repatriation Departihent, would inflict hardship. These represent only a few of tho numerous directions in which the committee haq, ijendered assistance to members of the New Zealand Expeditionary Force, as well as to men who served with the Australian, Canadian, Imperial, and South African Forces, and to sailors and stokers who served with the Grand and Pacific Fleets. Numerous letters of thanks have been received expressing appreciation of the services rendered by the association. The applications dealt with during the past year have been considerably more difficult of solution than those of any other year. The time required to dispose of any given claim was fully 50 per cent, more than required in previous years, for not only is every case submitted to the closest scrutiny, with the object of ascertaining that application, whore tenable. has been made for a war pension,Civil widow’s or old age pension, and to the Crown,Lands Department. Repatriation Department, or other branch of State service, hut it is frequently a matter of considerable difficulty to determine the degree of war disability and. resultant economic loss”