SHIRKING FAMILIES.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XXXVIII, Issue 1597, 12 August 1916, Page 3

SHIRKING FAMILIES.

OBLIGATION TO STATE. TO BE ENFORCED BY COMPULSION. The High I Hon. W. F. Massey, as chairman of the Recruiting Board, issued on Thursday the following statement: — “From time to time since the initiation of the new recruiting' scheme, the attention of the Recruiting Board lias been directed to families in different districts of the Dominion with two or more single suns of military age not one of whom has Joined the Expeditionary Force. Under the voluntary principle of enlistment, of course, it was impossible for the hoard to take any action in those cases, as (lie decision is left entirely to (he individual himself. But in response (o numerous requests tha( some other steps should he taken to bring home to such men a due sense ot (heir obligation to the Stall' and to their comrades and fellow-citizens who are already at the front, a section has been inserted in the Military Service Acr, which empowers the Minister for Defence, if he is satislied with respect to any family that it consists of two or more brothers or half-brothers, who belong to the First Division ot the Reserve and are not permanently unlit, to bring all or any of (hose brothers before a Military Service Board and there show a, cause why (hey should not. be called up for service in (he Expeditionary Force. “The Act having, now passed and become statute law, it is intended to bring this section into operation as early as possible, and if any eases as defined by it are still to be found when the Military Service Boards are set up, they will provide the first business for these hoards to adjudicate upon.”