DEFAULTERS' WORK AND RIGHTS

Evening Post, Volume CXXXVI, Issue 4, 5 July 1943, Page 4

DEFAULTERS' WORK AND RIGHTS

Public concern will be felt over a statement made during Court proceedings in Palmerston North by a man charged with refusing to cut kindling wood while in a military defaulters' detention camp. "I have been in a defaulters' camp for fourteen months," he is reported to have said, "and have not done one useful day's work. There are 700 men in the same camp who do nothing ;but twiddle their thumbs." Such statements must, of course, be accepted with reserve, but they do draw attention to a question on which there has been considerable obscurity —whether men who have refused to carry out obligations imposed by law are making any contribution to the war effort or whether they are permitted to idle their time away in complete security while others, who* have accepted their obligations, make all the sacrifices. The annual report of the National Service Department, recently submitted to Parliament, makes some

reference to this subject, but unfor tunately only in, very general terms. "The men placed in these camps/ says the report, "have been • employed in farming pursuits, ilax-growing, vege-table-growing, forest thinning and pruning, and breaking-in of land. In general the men are responding well to their obligations in the, camps, and much useful service., has been performed. Payment for this work has been governed by good conduct and industry marks, with a maximum of Is 3d a day. Some of the men in these camps are zealous workers, while others are politically opposed to anything in the nature of co-operation with the camp authorities, and were it not for the vigilance of the camp authorities these agitators would in many cases have exercised a bad influence on-the rest." This reference leaves so much unsaid that it cannot be accepted as .a* reliable guide to Xvhat is really happening in the detention camps, and is certainly no answer to criticism that has been voiced in Parliament and elsewhere. What, is needed to allay public concern is an authoritative statement giving more facts and figures than have so far been published.

Another, important question, raised in Parliament last week, is whether military defaulters detained in the special camps will be allowed to vote at the General Election. Up to a point the reply of the Prime Minister (Mr Fraser) was reassuring, but only up to a' point "Under the law as at present I do not see how they could vote," he said. "And I cannot see any redson' for making " any between people who are under restraint in,- any sort of institution. They are law-breakers." This is no doubt" a correct summing up of the legal position. It would be contrary to the law, and contrary to the wishes of the great majority of the public, to give military defaulters facilities to vote, either by placing ballot-boxes in the camps or by giving those detained special leave to record their votes. But at best Mr. Fraser's statement is merely an- indirect approach to .the problem; it is certainly, not ,the . most. satisfactory one. If, as in the last war, men who have, declined to obey, the laws of the country, made for the defence and security' of the country, are to be deprived of their civil rights, then there should be provision for that deprivation by legislation. In this way any uncertainty in the public mind as to ■ where these men stand in regard to then: civil rights would be removed The men would also be made to realise that their refusal to render service to their country in a time of emergency carries with it the logical penalty of not being.allowed to have any say in the government of the country. In such matters the direct approach is always to be preferred to the indirect.