N.Z.'S YOUTH.

Auckland Star, Volume LXVIII, Issue 128, 1 June 1937, Page 16

N.Z.'S YOUTH.

PHYSICAL FITNESS.

QUOTED IN AUSTRALIA. VISITOR'S COMPLIMENT. (From Our Own Correspondent.) SYDNEY. May 20. New Zealand lias recently entertained a distinguished Australian visitor— Brigadier-General H. W. Lloyd. M.A.R., who returned from the Dominion last week. He had been to New Zealand to represent the newlv-formed BritishAmerican Corporation, which aims at promoting an alliance between Britain and America in the interests of world peace. The fact that Sir Henry Braddon. an ex-New Zen lander, is president of this society would have commended Briga-dier-General Lloyd's mission to the sympathetic attention of all New Zealanders. Mr. Lloyd, however, is interested in many things beside world peace, and while he was over there he took special notice of the physique of New Zealand youth. He found, to his astonishment, that in this respect New Zealanders are, "generally speaking, ahead of the Australians." The reasons that he suggests for this difference are. first, that there are in New Zealand 110 large industrial areas to stunt the bodies and undermine the health of New Zealand's young men and women, and secondly, that in New Zealand physical training is better organised and worked on more comprehensive lines than in Australia. This question of physical fitness is one in which Brigadier-General Lloyd is especially interested, and not long ago he created something of a sensation here by suggesting that Australia's young men should be subjected to physical training and discipline on the lines adopted in Germany by Hitler to develop health and strength in the German people. It may be gathered that Brigadier-General Lloyd speaks with a good deal of authority in discussing such questions, and it may be concluded that the compliment which he has paid the Dominion in regard to the physical fitness of its young people is honest and sincere.