YEAR IN REVIEW.

Auckland Star, Volume LXXI, Issue 237, 5 October 1940, Page 6

YEAR IN REVIEW.

PATRIOTIC FUNDS.

£743,996 CONTRIBUTED.

WELLINGTON, Friday.

An outstanding feature of the accounts for the first complete year of operation presented to the standing committee of the Xational Patriotic Fund Board at a meeting to-day was the low cost of administration. During the year the board received from all sources contributions amounting to £743,996. The cost of administering those fund* was £889. Included in this sum were the travelling expenses to England of the board's overseas commissioner, Lieutenant-Colonel F. Waite.

The main items of expenditure relate to grants for tlie provision of amenities and comforts within Xew Zealand. The Joint Council of ihe Order of St. John and the New Zealand Red Cross Society has had for this purpose £11,300, the Salvation Army £13,559, the Y.M.CJL £35,999, the Church of England military affairs committee £3000, and the Catholic War Service Fund £3695. Part of the moneys in these accounts was for the erection and equipping of recreation huts in military camps. The following are details of expenditure:—Comforts on convoys for troops, £871; troops in New Zealand, £1812; troops overseas, £4129; First Echelon, £1692; Second Echelon, £2364; Third Echelon, £1990; regimental funds, £985; sick and wounded, £5392; Air Force relations' organisation, £1527. Grants overseas include: Toe H, London, £500; Salvatidn Army, London, £622; Y.M.C.A., Loudon, £2501; Victoria League, London, £25; Red Cross organisations, £15,572; Lord Mayor of London's relief of distress fund, £100,000. Comforts Overseas. Tii addition amounts have been remitted for contingency funds for the provision of comforts for the Xew Zealand forces overseas. Amounts sent in this way are: Egypt, £6735; England, £6225; sick and wounded, Egypt, £6250; sick and wounded, England, £12,450. -

Other expenditure includes £1739 for military bands for the purchase of equipment, £97 for a library service for troops, £561 for tlie Lady Gal wav Guild, £176 for the Navy League, £1300 for the purchase of * hostel for the Papakura camp. Auckland. The present credit of the national fund is £495,465. Part of the amount remitted for the relief of distress in London will be repaid to the board as a result pf the splendid response made *by the people of the Dominion. The total expenditure shown to date is £248,531. but in this amount is included money that has 'been sent overseas for contingency purposes and not vet spent. (Press Assn.)