GOING HOME TO ENLIST

Dominion, Volume 9, Issue 2671, 18 January 1916, Page 6

GOING HOME TO ENLIST

, NOT ENCOURAGED OFFICIALLY. The young _ man who prefers service with the British Anny rather than with the New Zealand Army is not encouraged. in this preference by the Internal Affairs Department, to whoso officers he must go in order to get permission to leave New Zealand. • Reference to this matter was made by the Minister of Internal Affairs yesterday. "A large number of applications," said Mr. Russell, "are coming in to us from men who wish to go Home and join the Flying Corps, but the information that one sees in the public Press is that there is practically no room for these men in the Aviation Corps. Consequently I am endeavouring to get authoritative information through the Defence' Department as to whether men going to England mth the ostensible purpose of enlisting in the Aviation Corps have any chance of being accepted for that service when they get there. If they have no chance, then there is no use in our letting them go. Numbers of young men tell us they wish to enlist as motor mechanics or as flying men. We have made this arrangement: We require every man asking to be allowed to go to England to enlist to make a sworn declaration that he is going Home to enlist, that he will enlist when he gets Home, and that if he cannot get into the branch of the Army ho wishes to enter, he will enlist in some other branch. These men are required, to present themselves at tho office of the New Zealand High Commissioner. The High Commissioner is supplied from here with the names of all the men going Home under these conditions, and he is asked to supply' a report "about every man. This report will be in the hands of the New Zealand Government should the man come back to New Zealand."