AUSTRALIAN ITEMS.

Otago Witness, Issue 3250, 28 June 1916, Page 21

AUSTRALIAN ITEMS.

The French Consul-general orders all French residents in Australia, between the ages of 18 and 49 years, immediately to undergo medical examination with a view to rendering military service. The Polish Relief Committee advises that £14,000 which was remitted from Sydney, has been held up in London, the British Government fearing that the money might be misused by the German Government.

It is announced that a regulation in the nature of a moratorium to protect soldiers' property is being framed. Rupert Thompson, a resident of Newcastle, who was for several months a prisoner in the Ruhleben camp in Germany, and was then exchanged owing to failure of his health, has recovered, enlisted, and is proceeding to France to fight his late captors. The British Australasian Tobacco Company has inaugurated a scheme to enable its employees to subscribe to the war loan. The company is prepared to buy any amount of war stock which the employees authorise, deducting from their wages 2s 6d weekly for every £lO invested.

The Federal Cabinet has referred the question of compulsory military training to the Military Board, upon whose report its action will be determined in the matter of calling out the various classes oi citizen forces for training, under the powers conferred by the Defence Act.