AID STOPPED

Auckland Star, Volume LXXIV, Issue 40, 17 February 1943, Page 4

AID STOPPED

SOLDIERS' GRANTS

SEQUEL TO PAY INCREASES

The recent increases in pay granted to men in the army are leaving their wives and families at home worse off than previously. The increases were based on 1/ a day for men overseas and 6d a day for men on home service. This position arises through the action of the Soldiers' Financial Aid Board in stopping payment of the grants made in cases where the soldier was receiving assistance to meet his civilian commitments. In one case the wife of a soldier serving within New Zealand was in receipt, of a grant of 7/6 a week. Her husband had made considerable financial sacrifice in entering the army, and on the allotment left his wife she was finding great 'difficulty m meeting their joint obligations, such as insurance; municipal rates and- interest on their property. The wife duly received notification from the Soldiers' Financial Aid Board that the board had reviewed the grant previously authorised, in the light of the increases in pay ana allowances made to the forces, stating that her grant had been reconsidered on the facts established in the application. In view of the changed circumstances the board decided that the assistance granted should be discontinued. The soldier's wife states that she is no better off as a result of the in-, crease in pay' received by her husband. She "fought for a .year" to get the 7/6 a week granted to help meet their financial obligations, but had been receiving it for only a few months when it was suddenly stopped. Husband Overseas Cases have been revealed of wives with young children,. whose husbands are overseas,- having" had their grants under the Soldiers' Financial Aid Board either stopped or reduced, leaving them less able than before to meet their obligations and purchase necessaries for their children. They find that the liability of buying school books 'and the high costs of such essentials as fruit and ordinary everyday articles of food, not to mention the heavy wear and tear on clothes, make their task harder since the pay increases were' granted to soldiers, followed, as they have been, by the action of the Soldiers' Financial Aid Board. The last increases in the pay of the home army, announced in December, ranged from 6d a day in the case of a private soldier, raising the total to 7/6 a day, while in the case of a colonel to 42/6, compared with 25/ previously.