CIVILIAN JOBS

New Zealand Herald, Volume 81, Issue 25053, 17 November 1944, Page 5

CIVILIAN JOBS

ANXIETY OF_ SOLDIERS FATE AFTER EUROPEAN WAR LONDON, Nov. 15 The Government's demobilisation schemes were debated in the House of Commons on Wednesday. Lieutenant-Colonel J. D. Profumo (Conservative—Accrington), who was flown back from Italy on leave to bring to light some of the ideas of the men and women serving overseas, said that there was widespread anxiety in his own theatre about the chance of men getting back their jobs and being able to keep their jobs. The men in the Mediterranean were speculating on the prospects of being sent to the Far East. Every effort should bo made to keep the number of women serving in the Far East to a minimum, he said. He hoped it would be a point of national honour that ex-servicemen should be given back their jobs. Service in the Tropics Major E. M. Keatings (Conservative—Suffolk), supported the case in favour of some further recognition of overseas service. Ho said that four or five years in the tropics, and especially under service conditions, had an effect physically and mentally which was more dangerous than service under temperate conditions. Mr F. J. Bellinger (Labour —Notts), said he believed the demands to meet the war after the defeat of Germany could bo filled mainly by voluntary effort. The Minister of Labour, Mr Ernest Bevin, said that with regard to men serving overseas the Government tried to do its best to get men out who had been involved at different periods in service abroad, as well as at home. He thought that the best thing to do in the interim period between the finish of the two wars was to go on calling up young men under the National Service Act who had been exempted. Mr Churchill told the House that three men would be responsible for the switch-over from war to peace production. They would be the President of the Board of Trade, _ the Minister of Production and the Minister of Labour. The only alternative would be to appoint a dictator or something like that. The Fight Against Japan Mr Bellinger asked whether total mobilisation would be necessary for the war against Japan. He said the House should also know what contribution the French and Dutch forces were going to make for the recovery of their Far Eastern colonies. "Are British troops to be urged to go overseas to fight for the recovery of a French colony which was wilfully and wantonly thrown away to the Japanese?" he asked, "or are the French themselves going to participate in the recovery of this colony?" General Sir George Jeffreys_ (Conservative—Petersfield, Hants) said he was a little afraid that there was a feeling against men being sent to fight Japan when the German war was over. He thought this feeling was held very largely by women. "I nope," he added, "that this feeling is not as prevalent as some people tell me it is."