RETURNED SOLDIERS

Manawatu Standard, Volume LVII, Issue 178, 29 June 1937, Page 8

RETURNED SOLDIERS

PROBLEM OF FINDING WORK. REQUEST TO MINISTER, Per Press Association. WELLINGTON, June 28. Some boys to-day are in the samo position as the returned soldiers who came back from tho war to find themselves out of industry because of age and lack of training, said the Minister of Defence (Hon. F. Jones) at the annual meeting of the Soldiers’ Civil lieestablishment League to-day when discussing difficulties facing the league in its efforts to get employment for returned men in trades and industries. He stressed the benefits that men placed in employment received from the psychological aspect and complimented the league on its work generalA presentation was made by Mr Jones to the retiring chairman, Major J. R. Kirk, who has held this position since the incorporation of the league in 1935.

Mr Kirk said that the scheme for placing the men in industries was becoming more difficult because the men were getting older every day and competition from younger men was in many instances too keen.

Tho limitations of tho factories established for the men were commented on by Major-General Sir George Richardson. The work provided made a great difference to the men psychologically and gave them a new outlook on life, but they had not been able to pass the men on to outside factories. To placo the men in permanent positions was the hardest task, he said. The chairman of the Christchurch branch committee, Mr H. B. Burdekin, spoke of the methods adopted in his centre for absorbing men into industries. The branch worked in co-opera-tion with the labour unions concerned and they had always been helpful. He suggested that war funds that were at present “frozen” to a large extent in bricks and mortar be liquidated and applied more directly to the relief of returned soldiers’ needs. The work of the Christchurch branch, he said, had saved the Government £3OOO in pensions.

A remit suggesting the appointment of an officer to organise and extend the work of the league throughout the Dominion was defeated. It was decided to widen the scope of the league to include ex-members of His Majesty’s forces other than New Zealanders who served in the Great War.

The meeting expressed appreciation of the Government’s efforts to provide full-time employment at standard rates of pay for fit ex-servicemen and strongly urged that tho claims of the disabled soldier should not be overlooked in the Government’s employment programme. Representations are to be made to the Minister of Education, Hon. P. Eraser, to reinstate the privilege previously enjoyed by disabled soldiers of receiving free vocational training at technical schools. Information regarding the schemes in operation for the reestablishment of disabled ex-servicemen in other countries is to be sought, and aiy information received is to be handed on to the provincial committees.