OWEN MACHINE-GUN

Auckland Star, Volume LXXIII, Issue 254, 27 October 1942, Page 4

OWEN MACHINE-GUN

PAYMENT TO INVENTOR Rec. 11.30. CANBERRA, this day. An immediate advance payment, on account of royalty, is to be made to Evelyn Owen, the inventor of the Owen sub-machine-gun, the Minister of the Army, Mr. Forde, has announced. The Government's decision follows a complaint by Mr. V. A. Wardell, manager of the factory where the guns are made, that, although the guns were being produced in quantity, Insufficient advantage was being taken of them by the army, and also a statement by Owen lhat, up to date, he had received no payment for the invention. Everything possible was being done to expedite the manufacture of the Owen guns and their delivery to the army, said Mr. Forde, who" declared that the army's sole concern was to place the best available weapons in the hands of the troops. The operational requirements and relative merits of particular weapons, in view of the circumstances at specified places and the training wnich we troops had received with various weapons, were all factors governing jne aeclsions as to the weapons to D © used.