BOTH FIT AND UNFIT

Manawatu Herald, Volume XL, Issue 1788, 12 February 1918, Page 4

BOTH FIT AND UNFIT

A SOLDIER’S DILEMMA

A returned soldier, Private Sydney Albert Green, formerly of the 7th L.H» A.M.C., stated the Sydney Sjjn recently, is in a dilemma. One s'st of doctors says he is fit —another says he isn’t. As a result, Green cannot get a living, and he has been refused n pension. ■ The circumstances, related by Green himself, are these-: He saw 'service at Gallipoli and in France for two years 212 days, and was in the A.I.P. altogether three years and 52 days. His discharge was on the ground of medical unfitness, and his character was endorsed as ‘‘Good.” He has been back in Australia since July of last year. He applied for a,block of land under the Returned Soldiers’ Settlement Act of 1916. “I was sent,” stated Green, “to a doctor at Challis House to am if J was physically fit to go on the land. Twelve months before, in England, a medical board reported that I was differing from mental instability as the result of shell-shock. After arriving in Australia I was for three months ai Broughton Hall, and was then discharged, presumably cured.

But the Lands Department doctor apparently acted upon the English board’s finding. At any rate, I was turned down.

“Baulked in that direction, I then did something I had no liking for. I applied for a pension. I was again examined, on this occasion by two doctors. They reversed the decision of the Lands Department doctor. The pension was refused, obviously on the ground that I was physically fit. I appealed against the* decision; I was told to report at the Victoria Barracks on 9th January. On that day two doctors questioiied me. I have heard nothing since. “I have no hfnd; I have no pension. I think I should get one or the other. I feel quite able to make a living out of it. I have heard of doctors differing before. People make jokes about it. This is no joke to me, I wish they would come to some agreement so far as I am concerned.”