WAR SERVICE

Wairarapa Times-Age, 28 August 1941, Page 7

WAR SERVICE

TREATMENT OF OBJECTORS REGULATIONS GAZETTED. DETENTION CAMPS & ECONOMIC EQUALITY. (By Telegraph—Press Association.) WELLINGTON. This Day. The duties of the special oneman tribunals set up to deal with conscientious objectors were defined in a statement in the House of Representatives last night by the Acting-Prime Minister, Mr Nash, in explanation of new regulations gazetted last night. i “Briefly, the duty of the tribunals," he said, “will be to ensure that for the purpose of the war the financial position of objectors is to be no better than it would be if they were serving in the armed forces and also that they should be employed on civil work under civil control of such a kind as public interest requires, whether that means continuing in their existing employment or going into other work. “These men will not be forced on employers, but will be placed where they are needed and wanted, and the surplus of their wages allowed by the commissions will be paid into the Social Security Fund.” The tribunals, said Mr Nash, would have full authority to call before them conscientious objectors and any other person with a view to ascertaining the financial position and the appropriate employment in regard to each objector so that they could make the proper orders. Inquiries by the tribunals would be in camera, unless the tribunals directed otherwise and they would be as informal as possible. Private information of the objectors’ financial position would be given. The decisions of the tribunals would be published, but he did not know whether it would be said that a man was to pay, say, £2OO or £3OO a year. There would be no Star Chamber methods. Mr Nash said that any man who failed to carry out the orders of the tribunal would be liable immediately to prosecution in the civil courts, and to a sentence to a term of defaulter's detention for the duration of thq war. In addition to this class, provision was made for those men who, their appeals having been dismissed, still persisted in their objection to military service. Defaulters' detention had been provided as an alternative to imprisonment on conviction by a magistrate of any of the normal offences committed by objectors, such as failure to enrol, to report for military duty, to submit to medical examination, to put on a uniform, and so on. The term of detention would be for the duration of the war. and those men who had already been sentenced to imprisonment, either by a magistrate or by a court martial, for offences of that type, might be transferred to defaulters’ detention. STRICT DISCIPLINE. “It is not intended in, any way” Mr Nash said “that defaulters' detention should be a holiday camp, and discipline in the camp will be strict, while the men will be engaged on useful work, suited to their capabilities. It is hoped that a prison camp can be macle available for use as the first detention camp, and Mr L. J. Greenberg, at present one of the senior executive officers of the National Commercial Broadcasting Service, will be detached from his present duties to inaugurate the camp. The tone and discipline of the camp will, of course, depend to a large extent on the personality and character of the man in charge, and it is for this reason that the Government has made its choice, Mr Greenberg is a returned soldier, and for the greater part of his life has given distinguished service to the Y.M.C.A. in New Zealand and overseas.” CONDITIONS OF RELEASE. Only in three ways could the release be effected of men held in defaulters’ detention camps, Mr Nash continued. First, a man might be discharged for the purpose of enabling him to serve in the armed forces, either as a combatant or non-com-batant. This might be pursuant to a voluntary election of the man himself or pursuant to an order given by the Minister of National Service, if he considered that the man should be in camp. Secondly, a temporary release might be granted to a man whom the special tribunal had ordered to be employed in civil work. Thirdly, a man reported by a medical board to be permanently medically unfit might be discharged. Mr Nash said that a great amount of time and help in formulating the regulations and assisting the law draftsman had been given by the tribunal members. Messrs A. H. Johnstone, K.C. (Auckland), H. F. O'Leary, K.C. (Wellington), and A. T. Donnelly (Christchurch).