LOCAL CAMPS.

Lyttelton Times, Volume CXVI, Issue 16992, 20 October 1915, Page 6

LOCAL CAMPS.

As offer' which the North Island leaders of the Legion of Frontiersmen have made to the Defence Department is worth some notice because of its bearing on the general demand' for district training camps for the reinforcements. A conference of leaders of squadrons and troops of tho Legion has resolved that if necessary it will establish preliminary training camps for its members under the supervision of the area officers for the various districts, and also, if it will bo of assistance to the Defence authorities, it will be prepared to receive into its camps recruits other than members , of the Legion for instructional purposes. An important point which tho Legion makes is that as very many members are contractors in country work, bushmen and seamen, there should ho some provision to enable tho men to go into camp immediately on enlisting. In the case of these workers the expensive delay of the present system is particularly vexatious, and is certainly a deterrent to recruiting. The Legion of Frontiersmen is no mere ornamental body; it is composed for the most part of hardy country men—farmers, survey hands, bush workers, road-makore, stockmen, and so on—and many of.

these have already seen active service. Out of a total strength of * seventeen hundred Frontiersmen, on the roll, twelve hundred have already enlisted in tho New Zealand contingents, in consequence of Mr Allen's refusal of a special Legion regiment. Tho training camps proposed by the Auckland meeting will he an excellent start, and there does not seem any reason why the Defence Minister and his officers should not cheerfully extend' support to tho schomo, which has all the promise of useful development. In any case enthusiasm and patriotic service of this kind deserve encouragement in tho prosent crisis, when every able-bodied man is heeded, and that urgently. ..Incidentally, tho Frontiersmen have strengthened the case for local camps. This morning wo print a letter to tho Minister of Defence signed' by representative citizens of Christchurch in which the argumonts in favour of local proparatory camps are assembled' plainly and moderately. Tho committee has very wisely decided to send a copy of tho letter to each of Mr Allen's colleagues, so that wo may expect the subject to receive the consideration of tho Cabinet as a whole. We think the arguments are sound and we have an impression that if they are pressed with sufficient energy the combined good sense of the Government will yield' to conviction.