SOUTH AFRICAN VETERANS.

Taranaki Daily News, 24 July 1920, Page 7

SOUTH AFRICAN VETERANS.

REPATRIATION BENEFITS WANTED. Speaking at the re-unioii dinner of the South African veterans at Stratford on i Thursday night, Mr. E. H. Young, president of the Stratford Returned Soldiers' Association, said that the Gov- , eminent had treated the returned soldiers of the late war very well indeed in the way of henefits, and he would now like to gee those benefits extended to the South African veterans. Later in the evening, Mr. T. De Launay, president of the New Plymouth branch of the Veterans' Association, in responding to the toast of. "Sister Branches," said it was very gratifying to see so many new branches being formed, and the time would soon come when a Dominion Conference would be called and they could then go to the Government and demand the benefits which the Government had neglected to grant to them for the past twenty years. There were dozens of South African veterans, he said, who were practically living on charity, and it was not right that such should be the case. The time was not far distant when there would be a huge Dominion body, and they would be strong enough to demand their just rights. Mr. T. Lawson, secretarv of the Stratford branch, said that the Wellington Returned Soldiers' Association had decided to admit South African veterans into the Association and permit them to wear the R.S.A. badge. He believed the Stratford Association would also be agreeable to such a course. Mr. Lawson expressed the opinion that instead of having small branches of the Veterans' Association at Stratford, Eltham, New Plymouth, and other places, more good would be obtained if there was one strong branch representing the whole of Taranaki. Other speakers endorsed Mr. De launay's and Mr .Lawson'g remarks.