DEFAULTERS

Evening Post, Volume CXXXII, Issue 45, 21 August 1941, Page 8

DEFAULTERS

MILITARY SERVICE

OUTLINE OF PROCEDURE

The procedure adopted in the case of military defaulters was outlined by the Acting Prime Minister (Mr. Nash) in the House of Representatives yesterday in a written reply to a question by Mr. J. A. Lee (Democratic Labour, Grey Lynn) on behalf of the member for Napier, the Hon. W. E. Barnard.

The question concerned two objectors to military service and asked whether Mr. Nash was aware that immediately these two men were discharged from Wellington Prison on August 2 they were collected by the military authorities and removed to Trentham Camp.

In his reply, Mr. Nash said that it had been decided that as a general rule a man who made default in reporting for medical examination or dispatch to camp, or in any other respect, would be prosecuted in the civil Courts for an offence against the National Service Emergency Regulations. If he was convicted and sentenced to a term of imprisonment, a military escort was detailed to attend at the prison on the termination of his sentence to conduct him to camp. He was not placed under arrest unless he refused to obey the orders given to him. On arrival in camp he wjas dealt with in the same way as any" other soldier who entered camp, but if he refused to obey commands he was prosecuted by courtmartial under military law.

Mr. Nash added that the two men mentioned in the question had been dealt with in accordance with this procedure.