A BIG SYSTEM

Dominion, Volume 10, Issue 3001, 12 February 1917, Page 6

A BIG SYSTEM

RECRUITING BRANCH AT WORK

RECORDS OF BALLOTED MEN

The development of the Recruiting Bi'anch to meet the requirements of the compulsory system ia one of the Temai'kable feature's of New Zealand's war effort. When the Military Service Act camo into operation the organisation required for its effective working -did not exist. The officers entrusted with the creation of the new Recruiting Branch had to start right at the beginning, lay out tho lines of their work and bring into being not merely a system, but also a staff. They liad no precedents to guide them, and they had to work at high speed' because recruits were wanted, and tho war would not wait. Three men. sitting in a room at Defence Headquarters laid the foundation of the branch, which to-day occupies the wholo of an tipper floor of a big city building, and provides employment for some seventy persons.

The Recruiting Branch receives from the Government Statistician the names of the men who have hew drawn by ballot for service in the Expeditionary Forces. It notifies each man by telegram and. letter that he has been called, tells him what to do and when to do it, and keeps in touch with. him until he has been sent to camp, declared unfit, assigned to home service, or dealt with definitely in some other way. If the supplied address proves incomplete or inaccurate, the branch takes steps to discover the man concerned. If the reservist wishes to appear before an Appeal Board, the branch makes tho necessary arrange-; meats and checks the various stages of the proceedings. If a reservist or a recruiting committee, a parent or an employer, has some question to ask or difficulty to raise, the branch listens and answers. The work is complicated enormously by tho fact that New Zealand, even now, has not got an absolutely reliable roll of her men of military age, owing mainly to the colonial habit of changing addresses and occupations with careless freedom. But it proceeds smoothly and quietly and the percentage of error is astonishingly small. The basis of tho whole system is to be found in the recruiting records. These records cover the balloted men and also the men who liavo been attested under the voluntary system siucc September last, when the new recruiting arrangements came into operation. They present in an easily accessible form the military history of each of these men, and they make detailed classifications that may be of immense value to the Dominion at a later stage of the ivar, when tho distribution of labour and the maintenance of essential industries become pressing questions. Ask the officer in charge of the records how many chimney sweeps have been drawn in the ballot, and he will have the information in a few seconds. He can add 1 tho names and addresses of the men and state whether they were fit or unfit. Ask how many Italians have been sent into camp to serve with the New Zealanders, and thero will be no waiting for tho answer. One of the card indexes has it ready. Or should tho Government wish to have a. list of the dairy-farmers or seamen, or hairdressers who have been sent into camp, or who have been drawn in the ballots but declared unfit, or who have been drawn and declared fit for home service, tho ' information could be supplied in a few moments. The records are as complete and detailed as those of a highlyorganised business house. • During the next week or ten days the names of nearly 7000 Reservists of the First Division, drawn iu the fourth ballot, will be handed to the Recruit- J ing Branch, and when this number has 1 been absorbed the records will con- ' tain particulars concerning more than 18,000 balloted men, apart from the £ volunteers. Every additional name on ; the list will involve a small mass of ! detail work. , It is certain that after tho distrilm- ; tion of the thousands of letters and , telegrams some mistakes will be reported. If John Brown, Reservist, hasi 1 omitted to mention on his registration card that he is a married man with five ohildren, he will have been enrolled in the First Division, and is liable to be picked up in the ballot.. He has an easy remedy through the Appeal Board. • Or if Thomas Smith, of a c certain address in Dunedin, has enrolled, and later has enlisted iu Wellington wider his full baptismal name of Thomas William Smith, ho may bo appearing in the records as' two men —Thomas Smith, Reservist, of Dunediin, and Thomas William Smith, soldier, of Wellington. Lists of attested volunteers are checked against the roll week by week, but the authorities have no way of preventing confusion of the kind indicated here. But people g who have realised tho magnitude of t the unaccustomed work that is being i done by the Recruiting Branch will not- 'J give exaggerated importance to the I occasional mistakes. They will rather t appreciate the very high average of ef- (; ficiency and success. • (■