AN ALL-OUT EFFORT

Dominion, Volume 36, Issue 310, 25 September 1943, Page 7

AN ALL-OUT EFFORT

Manpower Mobilization In

Britain

(British Official Wireless.) RUGBY, September 23. Opening a debate on manpower iu the House of Commons, the Minister of Labour and National Service, Mr. .Bevin, stressed the importance of anticipating heavy casualties when the second front came into action. In the gigantic struggle which would be facing us in 1944, he said, every provision must he made lor them’. Saying that mobilization had reached a stage in Britain not excelled by any other country, Mr. Beviu added that to date they had registered all women between the ages of IS and 47. “I take it that it is the will of the House that I ought to stop at nothing till we have won, whatever the consequences may be,” he said. “Of the 33,000,01)0 people between 17. and 64 at my disposal, 22.650,000 are in the Services. in civil defence, or in paid employment. That includes 700,000 women doing part-time work. Of 16,000,000 males in the country between 14 aud 65, more than 15,000,000 are in the service of t.h e country or in paid employment. Of 17.000.000 women between 14 and 64, 7,750,000 are iu the Services or paid employment. More titan 1.000,000 are doing unpaid voluntary work and giving service to the country of a national character. Caro of Children.

“Afore than 9,000,000 children under 14 have to be looked after. .This I regard as a national service. Of single women between 18 and 40, 91 per cent, are working. That leaves ouly 9 per cent, for sickness or ailments. More than SO per cent, of married women of that age group without children are engaged in the war effort.” Commenting on these achievement*. Mr. Beviu declared: “We had to do. it, ami we have done it, which, I think, is a triumph of British organization and genius.” He added that there were more than 1,000,000 men and women over 65 in full-time paid employment iu the war effort. On the Alerseyside and in Manchester the average age of the dockers was 51, and they were giving a remarkable turn-round of ships. "I saw. the other day. a man of S 3 wheeling ocwtbags of Cuban sugar,” he added. The Alinister said that more than 2,500.000 women had been, recruited to the forces and to industry from the nonmanual aud non-industrial classes. Between January last year and June this year more than 1,000,000 persons were added to the forces and to the muni--tions industry. Britain was employing 2,250,000 people more on munitions than at the end of the last war.

Planes Come First.

Cabinet had decided to give priority to aircraft construction, and women up to 50 living iu aircraft districts could be of great help if they went iu at once. One million six hundred thousand women between 40 and 60 were already in employment,. and more than 500,000 between 46 and 50. The Minister said he recognized that in calling up the older women great care would have tp be exercised. He added that he wanted 30,000 incn for the mining industry as soon as possible, and 20,000 next year if vacancies still existed after use had been made of those who had opted or had volunteered. Professor J. J. Craik-Henderson (Conservative) said that the United States up to now had not conscripted one woman, and he suggested that there could be cuts in the staffs of Government Departments before calling up middle-aged women. Mrs. Adamson (Labour) said that, speaking generally, women in Britain were not opposed to the direction of women between 45 and 50 into industry.