THE MISSING NAVY PENSIONS.

Hokitika Guardian, 18 September 1917, Page 4

THE MISSING NAVY PENSIONS.

■ There are some thousands of men in the British N/ivv today who are being deprived of the*pensions they have earned. These are beingwithheld under cover of an Order in Council of August 3, 1914, by which the. Admiralty were authorised to retain for a further period of five years the services of any man whose term of enlistment might expire during hostilities; but it is a fact to be noted that this Order says nothing of depriving men of the pensions they have earned and which, according to two recent First Lords (Mr McKenna and Mr Churchill), are the lawful and personal possessions of the men who have earned them.

Let me put the facts briefly and plainly*. When a youth thinks of joining the Navy he probably gets hold of the official- pamphlet intended to strengthen, his desire in that direction, and there he <is told without any-equivoeation that “after twenty-two years’ qualifying, service, pensions are awarded tor life.” That is the basis of his contract with the Admiralty and the nation on this matter, and the nation ought to know that its agents produced this order in Council from under -the tails of their coats in order to deprive the men ot that to which thev have become entitled.

Any* petty officer or man in the Navy who completes his twenty-two years’ service after August 3, 1914, is not allowed to leave the service nor is he given his pension. He is given instead “detained pay” of twopence a day : and Dr Macnamara who has recently* developed an amazing hardihood where the affairs of our fleetmen are concerned, told the House of Commons a couple of months ago that they are really much better off than those who, having completed their time before the outbreak of war, are drawing both their pensions and the full ordinary pay of llieir rifting when called up for service. This is palpably absurd, but the House of Commons, containing 11c one who knows anything about the affairs of the Navy swallowed it whole.

I)r Maenamara further pointed out that at the end of the war the detained man would get an addition to his pension “in respect of length of service.” This is not true.- If a man during his twenty-two years’ I pension time has an uubroken record lor good conduct and so forth, his “service pension ” will amount 'to is ad a da}- —hod for twenty-two years’ service, 2d for three good conduct badges, id for the good conduct medal, and id for “all V.G.’s ” in his reports. Now, under the King’s Regulations, “ the total pension'for service, badges, character, and medal shall not exceed is 2d a day” ; so that if the man goes on for another twenty years he cannot increase his pension for length of service. That is only possible for the man who, because of a black mark somewhere, did not manage to earn the is 2d in his twenty-two years. In other words, the good man can get nothing extra for detained service in war; and the “not quite so good ” can only earn a penny a day for each completed term of years. A fair and honest Admiralty —not a generous one—would pay the men in accordance with the contract made with them—i.e., “after twenty-two years’ qualifying service pensions are awarded for life.” It y would raise the basis of the pension from rod a day to nd, for it stood at iod, before the qualifyingperiod was raised from twenty years to twenty-two.' It would increase the pension by a half-penny a day for every year of subsequent service, and it would count every year as two in war time. At the very least it would not creep out of its contracts behind such a poor-spirited device as an Order in Council.