MILITARY DEFAULTERS.

Hawera Star, Volume XLVIII, 29 November 1924, Page 5

MILITARY DEFAULTERS.

ALARMING INCREASE. Recent prosecutions of large numbers of military defaulters may have led citizens to believe that the potentia. defenders of the Dominion were decreasing at an. alarming irate (states the Christchurch Press). They will be ireassured by the statement made by. Major 11. A. Row, D. 5.0., officer m charge of the Canterbury Defence District, to a reporter. “There is no great dislike for military training among the youth of Canterbury,” he declared; “the great majority of the traiuees are; quite happy. A certain number, of course, have a distaste for it, but many are very keen. You. ought to come round and see the Saturuay evening voluntary N.C.O.’s class, whicn is regularly attended by 60 or 80. Volunteers were recently called for a Guard of Honour to the Governor-Gen-eral, and the training entailed three extra parades a week, but there were more applications than were necessary, although the guard consisted of 126 men.” Asked if the portent of the prosecutions was that military defaulting was gaining in popularity, Major Row said, “Certainly not, the number of defaulters is getting smaller. The large number of offenders dealt with at the court in the last two months is really the ‘washings-up’ of trainees who. have not rendered personal service during the last military year, and it in no way represents the normal number of prosecutions.” Applications for exemption, the Major said, were very few, and the percentage of defaulters for twelve months' prior to November 1 was less than three. Only 154 trainees out of a total strength of the. 5000 cadets and 1500 Territorials in Christchurch had been prosecuted.