MISSING SOLDIERS

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXVIII, Issue 24000, 25 June 1941, Page 8

MISSING SOLDIERS

ARMY ALLOWANCES

PRISONERS OF WAR Provisions for the granting of allow, an cos and allotments to dependants of Expeditionary Force soldiers who are reported missing or are taken prisoners of war were officially explained yesterday. The position is covered by Army regulations. In ail cases where men are reported dead or missing the allotment and allowances shall be continued for three months after notification of the casualty. Thereafter the ordinary war pension provisions operate where the casualty has been a result of war service. if it is discovered within the period of three months that a soldier reported missing is a prisoner of war, the allotments and allowances are made continuous until the end of the war. In other cases, where the fate of a man reported missing remains unknown, the norma] practice is for a" war pension to be issued at the end of three months, the pension replacing the active service payments. Should the discovery be made at 8 later date, following the issue of a war pension, that a soldier is a prisoner of war, the procedure is for the allotment and allowances to be restored and necessary adjustments made to cover any difference between these amounts and the pension since the date .on which the pension was issued. As the payment of war pensions is the responsibility of the Social Security Department, arrangements are made during the three months after the notification of the casualty for a transfer from the payroll of the Army Department: to that of the Social Security Department. Restoration of Army rates, in cases where this becomes necessary later as a result of fresh information, is made by a transfer back from the Social Security Department to the Army. No cases have yet- occurred where transfers have been made as a result of men being posted as missing whose actual fate is unknown, but it is expected that many will have to be dealt with in the latter part of next month, ! three months after the campaign in | Greece.