RECRUITS FOR SERVICES

Press, Volume LXXXIX, Issue 27091, 14 July 1953, Page 6

RECRUITS FOR SERVICES

FALL NOTED IN BRITAIN

INCREASED PAY MAY BE GRANTED

(Special Correspondent N.Z.P.A.) LONDON, July 12. Britain’s three Service Ministries ire urgently examining the whole service pay structure with the object of attracting men into the forces to overcome the acute shortage of technicians, senior n.c.o.’s, and middle-rank officers, such as captains and majors, says Lieutenant-General H. G. Martin, the military correspondent of the Daily Telegraph.” “The 1950 pay code already has been overtaken by events,” he says. “So many skilled tradesmen of the R.A.F. ground staff are being tempted by high pay in civil life to exercise their short-term options to leave the service that maintenance of the R.A.F. is dangerously threatened. “Recruiting returns for the three services to be published shortly are likely to show a sharp fall in the numbers of the Army and R.A.F. during the first six months of this year compared with the same period last year.

“With the forces at their present strength, the cost of a new pay code weighted to obtain the men needed would be great. It might increase the bill from the present £280.000.000 to £330,000.000. Even without this, the cost of the armed forces in the movement of supplies, stores and works is continuously increasing with the rise in prices. There is already pressure from the Treasury for economies.

“As far as the Army is concerned, manpower offers the only possible source of saving. Votes for production, research works and buildings have already been cut to the bone. The conclusion is that in a time of so-called peace it would be financially impossible to maintain on the new pay code now under consideration an Army at its present strength of about 450,000 men.