TREATMENT OF DEFAULTERS

Press, Volume LXXXI, Issue 24600, 23 June 1945, Page 6

TREATMENT OF DEFAULTERS

Condemnation By R.SA.

DEMAND TO BE MADE TO PRIUtI! MINISTER

(P.A.) WELLINGTON, June 22. A march on Parliament to present the association’s views on military defaulters and their treatment v/aa suggested at the conference b#| the New Zealandßeturned Services’ Association to-day. After many delegates had spoken and emphasis had been laid-on the number of defaulters '.‘not behind barbed wire—those in essential, industry, for instance”—it was decided when the Prime Minister (the Rt. Hon, P. Fraser) returns a special meeting of delegates be called to present the association's unanimous demand for action. _ T The Dominion president (Mr B. J. Jacobs) moved the following statement in the form of a resolution: “The council had always advocated that the people of New Zealand should be called upon to make equal sacrifices. The association originally urged the Government to introduce conscription, thereby permitting the Dominion to maintain loyally its obligations to Britain, Bearing in mind the magnificent record of the New Zealand Division and members of the other fighting services while defaulters enjoyed protection and numbers of them were defying the laws of the country and shirking their duties, the association deplored that the Government, although pressed by it for a considerable period, failed to enunciate any policy regarding defaulters until after the European war had been won. “The council further deplored the fact that the Government failed to carry out its duty to declare that men who failed to carry out their obligations should be debarred from employment in Government departments or in any concern maintained by the funds of taxpayers and should be deprived of civil rights for 10 years, and now expressed its disgust that the Government had seen fit to betray servicemen and their dependants by establishing tribunals to have cases reheard. “The association emphatically protested against the setting up of the tribunals and especially agqmst the method of hearing appeals in camera. The association demanded that defaulters be not released until 12 months after hostilities end or until such time as all men from overseas have been rehabilitated, and that they should be deprived of civil rights for 10 years, and that the representations regarding employment should be given effect to. The finding of the Parliamentary committee in November, 1944, had been endorsed by Parliament but the Government had flouted and overridden that constitutional authority." The resolution was carried unanimously. ,