Wairarapa Times-Age WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 24, 1943. WAR AND PEACE TRAINING.

Wairarapa Times-Age, 24 February 1943, Page 2

Wairarapa Times-Age WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 24, 1943. WAR AND PEACE TRAINING.

‘A.'T a meeting of the Wellington Technical College Board of Governors on Monday evening at which several aspects of the apprenticeship problem were discussed, it was stated that some employers would not take on further apprentices at present I because they had already lost several to the armed forces, whom they were bound to reinstate after the war, and they could not face the possibility of ultimately having to find jobs for an army of apprentices. The chairman of the board, Mr AV. Appleton, said the common sense solution seemed to be to give youths three months’ training in the armed forces and then send them back to civil employment. Provision had already been made for that course to be adopted, he added (as he is reported Mr Appleton did' not say by whom this provision had been made), “but in fact hundreds of boys had been taken into the armed forces and then not allowed to return to their civil jobs at the end of three months.” Here it is once again emphasised that where the military training of youths from the age of 1.8 onwards is concerned, the Government is pursuing a policy which runs directly counter not only to the interests of these youths, but at a broad view to national interests as well. The facts of the position have been repeated so often that they must be familiar to everyone, but repeated protests against the Government’s policy where the military training of youths between the ages of 18 and 21 is concerned apparently have all fallen on deaf ears. There is no visible approach to what Mr Appleton justly called the common sense solution of giving lads three months’ training in the armed forces and then sending them back to civil employment. , Bearing in mind that lads are not eligible for overseas service in the Army until they .have attained the age of 21, there is nothing whatever to be said against the course of allowing them, between the ages of 18 and 21, to devote part of each year to military training and another part to apprenticeship or other civil training or studies. As matters stand, these lads are "being denied, cpiite needlessly, industrial and other training which might have stood them in good stead throughout life. At the same time the Dominion is being deprived as needlessly of what should have been a vital oncoming reinforcement of its body of skilled workers. Much time has been allowed to pass without anything being done to establish a common sense arrangement under which lads would get both military and civil training. It is so much the more imperative that action should be taken without delay to amend this state of affairs. There can be no defence of or excuse for the outrageous waste of youth and suppression of industrial and other training and study that is going on at present. The Army education scheme, now at last reported to be in operation, should serve in itself an excellent purpose, but no scheme of this kind can provide adequately for the civil training of lads approaching manhood. The solution where these lads are concerned plainly is to permit them to divide the year between military training and civil training or study..