MILITARY TRAINING.

Lyttelton Times, Volume CXXIII, Issue 16034, 14 September 1912, Page 4

MILITARY TRAINING.

TO TDK EDITOR. Sir,-—I must protest against the way in which my enclosure was omitted from ho rest of my letter in to-day’s issue of the “ Lyttelton Times.” It was not an ordinary case, and tho person should not have been punished at all because the case was withdrawn against him. If the lad was convicted, then tho punishment was sevoro, but, seeing that tho case was dismissed, what right had anyone to force him to pay other persons’ expenses? The punishment, I say again, was 'too severe, especially as !ho lad was only nineteen years of age, and if wo compare it with sentences imposed upon other classes of defaulters it stands alono for a deliberate attempt to crush him. Take tho ease of drunks and petty thieves. Do we find these marching through the streets to crack stones when they are in for forty-eight hours? I know from experience that they aro given very light work, such as cleaning brass, cells, and other indoor work. It is a pity they are not given arduous work to bring them to realise they aro wasters. The experience I speak of is not the result of drunkenness, but of failing to u register ” under the Defence Act, which I have not done yet. During iny incarceration I may say I kept my cars and eyes open, and I realise what our prison system is. Instead of reforming it degrades and tends to debase any human being down to a level below decency. It stands as a disgrace to our modern so-called reformative treatments. Would it not he better to do our utmost to enable mon to earn a good wage and live comfortably than to spend good money on schemes, that bring no returns except machines. dressed in drab khaki and defilement of our youths’ character ? Another worthy point to consider in the case I am quoting is that tho whole' procedure was illegal because the oath has been declared so by two magistrates, and the drafting of lads direct into the Territorial Force is also illegal, seeing that the gulf caused by tho non-existence of the general training section still exists and the persons in authority aro disregarding tho very principles that they themselves concocted. Who should be prosecuted but the military officers for non-attentiou to the fundamentals of their fosterscheme, hut positions and good salaries enable a lot of things to be winked at, and it rests with tho people to say whether this scandalous state of persecution shall continue.—l am, etc., THOMAS MJTTALL. September 12.