AUSTRALIA’S DEFENCE

Grey River Argus, 1 August 1940, Page 8

AUSTRALIA’S DEFENCE

£454 MILLIONS . To be Spent Before 1943 G [Per Press Association] (Received July 31, 11.30 p.m.). MELBOURNE, July 31. An official statement was issued by the Commonwealth Government today which deals with the effective manner in which Australia’s defence foundation has been laid. The statement says: “The defences were never so strong, enabling the Nation to become self reliant. The cost of the war programme for the four year period 1938-39 to June. 1942, will be 454 million pounds. The total enlistments for the three fighting ser-| vices for the past eleven months of! the war to J'une 30 were 121,000 The number of persons at present engaged in producing munitions is fifteen thousand two hundred. The output of munitions by the end of the 1 present year wiil be eight times greater than it was in April, 1939. By the end of next June, there will be 150,000 employed in the Australian armament industry. Naval expansion has also been very substantial,

as, in addition to ships of the Australian Navy, five vessels have been converted to merchant cruisers and thirty as war auxiliary vessels, 'while more than one hundred and fifty merchant ships have been defensively equipped. Ten destroyers and patrol vessels are at present under cop-[ struction in Australian shipyards.” j The statement also refers to the; splendid headway in the building of aircraft, oft which eight million pounds has been earmarked. Since the outbreak of the war, sixty thousand militiamen have received one month’s training, seventy-five thousand men three months’ training, and fifty-four thousand four months’ training.