The Manawatu Herald. Tuesday, February 15, 1915. LOCAL BODIES AND RECRUITING.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XXXVIII, Issue 1510, 15 February 1916, Page 2

The Manawatu Herald. Tuesday, February 15, 1915. LOCAL BODIES AND RECRUITING.

At last night’s Borough Council meeting a motion was carried by five to three, rejecting the Recruiting Board’s proposal to assist in local recruiting on the ground that the Government should bring in conscription if the voluntary system does not meet the requirements necessary for reinforcements. Of course, the local authority’s motion does not reflect absolute local public opinion. It is more the opinion of Councillors so far as their individual efforts re recruiting is concerned. They feel, no doubt, that their efforts in recruiting would not meet with that success which the Board anticipates and that nothing will Bhift the slacker and shirker except conscription. Then, again, there are quite a number of people in the community who hold very strong views on the point that the conscription of wealth should be embodied in the conscription of flesh and blood. The treatment meted out to the returned wounded is causing grave concern, which would be obviated if the Government exercised a controlling hand over the surplus profits produced by the war. People are now refusing to further contribute to the patriotic fuuds because the giving is not on an equitable basis. Plenty of wealthy people are banging back from voluntary giving because they prefer direct taxation. The local Council is as patriotic and as loyal as any in the Dominion and they recognise the seriousness of the present crisis, but they object to the methods sought to be adopted by the Government through the Recruiting Board.

Tub Foxton Borough Council is not the only local governing authority which has refused to assist the Board as the following letter written in reply by the Board (Rt. Hon. W. F. Massey, Sir Joseph Ward and the Hon. Jas. Allen) to the Masterton County Council testifies; “We have received the letter written by your county clerk on the 9th instant, forwarding copy of a resolution passed by the Masterton County Council to the effect that it would be impossible for any of its members to assist in the recruiting movement as set forth in the letter from the Recruiting Board, and that it is the duty of the Government to ensure the enrolment of sufficient reinforcements during the present European crisis by compulsion, should the voluntary system not prove successful. We have also received advice ot a similar resolution having been passed by the Waipa County Council. It is with the greatest concern that the Recruiting Board learns that there are in the Dominion of New Zealand bodies of public men who are

apparently so unable to realise the gravity of the present position and to appreciate the terrible menace now threatening us, in common with the rest of the Empire of which we form a small but intensely loyal part, as to dismiss in this oil-band manner an appeal which is the outcome of the serious and considered judgment of the Recruiting Board, acting for and on behalf of the National Government. The Board is bound to express to you its strong conviction that it is the sacred duty of every loyal public man to come forward in this time of national stress and render the fullest service in his power to make this scheme, which is the result of much anxious care and thought, a complete and lasting success. The Board, speaking with the complete knowledge of all the issues involved which it alone can possess, wishes to emphasise in the strongest possible way its opinion that no suggestion of compulsion should be considered until the voluntary system of enlistment has been thoroughly tested and proved to be inadequate to secure the flow of men necessary to fulfil our honourable obligations in this world struggle for the maintenance of liberty and justice. The Board is now providing the ways and means by which the voluntary system can be thoroughly and exhaustively tested, and it feels that it is entitled to, and will undoubtedly receive, the active and sympathetic help and co-operation of every loyal and patriotic public man and citizen of this Dominion. With respect to the latter part of your council’s resolution, the Recruiting Board would like to know how the voluntary system can possibly be successful it other public bodies and other public men followed a lead so inimical to success as that set by the Masterton and Waipa County Councils ?”