WORK FOR RETURNED SOLDIERS

Southland Times, Issue 24592, 14 November 1941, Page 8

WORK FOR RETURNED SOLDIERS

Sir, —I notice from a report of the City Council meeting published in The Southland Times on Wednesday, November 12, that a councillor suggested we should look ahead and prepare a scheme of work over a period of years, advancing as an argument that the soldiers would be returning and looking for work and that this would be the means of finding employment for them, or words to that effect. It must be gratifying to the boys who are away to find that jobs of ditching and so on are to be provided for them when they return. The war is not over yet, and I suggest that those people who live in ease and comfort and who are making no sacrifices and are not likely to make any should keep up the slogan for a little while longer that “Nothing is too good for the soldier,” even if they in--tend to try and push him into a ditch when he returns. What a prospect for those gallant men who fought that brilliant rear-guard action out of Greece with the odds 10 to one against them! What about the men who went through crimson hell in Crete and who are suffering the agonies of desert life, and God knows what they have yet to face up to? Yes, their reward according to that report will be in keeping with those sacrifices. To whom it may concern, let me say, arid I am speaking as an old soldier who had a lengthy period in the last war and did not come out unscathed, that the soldiers on this occasion will take charge and decide their own destiny. Not only will they take charge of the city, but they will also take charge of the country if it becomes necessary for them to do so for the' purpose of obtaining justice. Sir, may I suggest that if the City Council wishes to have the mud flats cleaned up to make them more pleasant to the eye of those people who have the means and time to sail around them in their launches it should apply to have the conscientious objectors put on the job. I refer to the yellow crowd, the rack- . eteeers, not the good honest fellow who accepts non-combatant service and takes all the risks. OLD DIGGER.