FINANCIAL AID

Dominion, Volume 10, Issue 3037, 26 March 1917, Page 6

FINANCIAL AID

FOR RECRUITS WITH HEAVY ? RESPONSIBILITIES

BOARD MAY BE SET UP

The scheme for the giving of special financial assistance to reservists "called up in the ballot who may have, more than ordinarily heavy, responsibilities is not yet in full working. . A considerable number of applications have been received', however. The scheme provided that reservists should make their applications in appeals, to the Military Service Boards, and that the boards should send the applications forward with recommendations to the Minister of Defence. But the Minister of Defence finds that he is not in a position to decide upon the recommendations, and Sir James Allen is considering, the advisability of setting up a special board to deal. with these applications. A special board could receive the applications forwarded in the ordinary way frcm the Military Service Boards, and also such as ma : y come from men who have already volunteered, from men who have not had a chance to make an application before, and from men who do not wish to appeal on the ground of hardship, but who may none the less be under hardship. If this board should require information as to the special circumstances of any man, it could get this information through tho Military Service Board sitting in the man's dis-trict.-All these cases will require careful consideration, and the amount to be given, according to the degree of the man's necessity, must he -always' determined by some standard rules, or , on some basis which shall be constant. If the amount of tho grants were to be variable in different localities, according to the opinions of ! different Military Service Boards, the.Minister fears that the.scheme could not work smoothly or successfully.