NOTES AND COMMENTS

Dominion, Volume 35, Issue 262, 4 August 1942, Page 4

NOTES AND COMMENTS

Twenty-eight years ago today, the time for the receipt of a reply from Berlin to the request of the British Government for an assurance of respect for Belgian neutrality having expired, a state of war was declared. The then Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs has placed on record how he sadly “watched the lights go out over Europe,” for that marked the end of his great effort to maintain peace. But there were some bright spots even in that dark night. There were neutrals whose rights were respected, whose lands were spared. Aud that seems to have been regarded by the enemy of 1942 as a weakness. To them neutrals have no rights when compared with Nazi desires, and the darkness over Europe in 1914 was only twilight when compared witli the Stygian darkness of the present outlook. But possibly 24 years ago, when people commented on the commencement of the fourth, year of war, they did not realize that, the end of the dark night was near. In the course of a few weeks the fourth year of this grim struggle will be entered upon, and now, as then, the future is veiled, but there is the growing strength of the Allied arms to afford confidence, lhe deeper assurance of a righteous cause to give stability, and faith in the ultimate outcome to ensure national endurance.

Perhaps no better indication of the immensity of the American war effort, in lhe realm of production, has yet been given than the statement of the director of air transportation for the War Production Board that “the principal bottle-neck was steel.” The latest figures relating to American output of steel castings and ingots placed it at 47,250,000 tons per annum, and as exports of steel and steel manufactures have not been large, the bulk of the output is being used locally. Toward the end of last year some of the largest steel-producing centres reported that the output was up to 98.5 per cent, of the theoretical maximum, and some of the chief plants have been recording immense figures. Yet, big as they are, the demand for aircraft engines, for ships and their engines and for a thousand and one other tilings, exceeds it. The country producing more than twice as much steel as any other needs more to keep pace witli the war production programme. It must lie, to use an American phrase, “some programme.’

Judging from examples given in a news article on Saturday there is need for an oflicial examination of the schedule of allowances for officers, N.C.O.’s, and men of the Army living outside camp. It certainly appears anomalous that certain officers in camp, and therefore “found,” draw highei salaries than do others of the same rank who live at home and travel to and from duty at their'own expense. Non-commissioned men and privates in staff billets, together with officers, receive a subsistence allowance of 2/6 a dav. which is said to represent compensation for their having “to find their own board and quarters.” If this description of the allowance is correct, then the amount is obviously inadequate—not much more than a token payment. As was pointed out in the article, the Regulations pioviding for the compulsory billeting of inembers of the armed foices b,y civilians fix Um rate of payment for such accommodation at 5/- for a day's keep—twice the amount the soldier is given to pay for that keep. The problem is. one fraught witii considerable difficulty, for it must be recognized that witli an Army establishment such as exists in New Zealand today even a small per capita increase in expenditure represents a formidable aggregate sum. Military pay rates, like other forms of national expenditure, are —and must be —iidliienced by the length of the national purse. This does not mean, however, that ill-balance as between one set of payments and another is excusable. On the contrary the existence of modest slamlards of military pay is an important reason why any unfair differences should be removed.