CIVIL DEFENCE OPERATION

Press, Volume XCVIII, Issue 28894, 14 May 1959, Page 9

CIVIL DEFENCE OPERATION

Role For Emergency Organisation (New Zealand Press Association) WELLINGTON, May 13. In the operation of the Civil Defence Ministry it would be necessary to decentralise civil defence measures, and the Government would build on the existing emergency organisation which had been created to cope with any major disaster, the Minister of Internal Affairs (Mr /X.nderton) said today. The Minister is to take over the Civil Defence Ministry, and to have the title of Minister of Civil Defence. The Secretary for Internal Affairs is also to have the corresponding title of Director of Civil Defence. Mr J. K. Hunn, Acting Secretary for Internal Affairs, has assumed the title and duties of Acting Director of Civil Defence. The new Ministry would have the general responsibility for the planning and co-ordination of civil defence. The purposes of civil defence were comparable to those of the E.P.S. before, during, and after the last war, though with the appearance of nuclear weapons the threat to civil populations was in many ways different. “The manifold aspects of civil defence concern the local authorities and the relevant voluntary organisations and the public generally no less than the Government,” the Minister said. He added that broad plans for civil defence were already in hancL The Minister said that with the agreement of the Australian Federal authorities it had been decided that an officer of the Minister of Civil Defence who had been concerned for some time past in emergency planning—Mr C. A. Sharp—would go to Australia shortly to take a course at the Australian Civil Defence College and have discussions with the Australian civil defence authorities.

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