R.S.A, CONFERENCE

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume LXXIV, Issue 17694, 21 October 1919, Page 5

R.S.A, CONFERENCE

(Per Press Association

WELLINGTON, October 20

The Pay and Allowances Committee, reporting with regard to a Wellington remit that the New Zealand rate of pay be raised to that of the A.1.F., and to be retrospective, stated that it had no recommendation to make, leaving decision to the full conference. Mr. A. B. Sievwright (Wellington), convenor of the committee, moved the adoption of the remit, and spoke in support of it. The remit was decisively rejected, the only delegate who voted in favour of it l.ising Mr. Sievwright.

The Employment of returned soldiers formed the subject of a report by the Repatriation Committee, which stated that it found many soldiers had been refused re-employ-ment in the Public Service on account of war injuries. The committee urged that employment at a wage comparable with what they would have been receiving had they not enlisted should be found for them; that-a. separate superannuation fund subsidised by the Government be established in order to remove any difficulty in connection with superannuation; that no soldier so re-em-ployed shall lose by reason of war service any annual increment to which he would otherwise have been entitled. The report was adopted.

The Pay, Allowances and Gratuities Committee recommended that every endeavour be made to have the increase in the rate of: officers' pay made fully retrospective; that soldiers' financial assistance be made fully retrospective to all members of the N.Z.E.F., and that legislation be introduced to give edect to this principle; that clause 12 of the Government's scheme, as passed by Parliament, in which these allowances cannot be claimed as a right, and are issued at the discretion of the Minister of Defence, should be withdrawn. The clause referred to reads as follows: Nine of the allowances authorised in this order can be claimed as a right, but are issued at the discretion of the Minister of Defence. The recommendations were adopted.

With regard to gratuities, the conference resolved that the period spent in hospital by returned soldiers in New Zealand be counted as active service for the purpose of a gratuity, provided gratuities cease on June 28th, 1919, whether such soldiers are discharged or not. It was also decided that as a general principle gratuities of deceased soldiers should be paid to the legal representatives of such soldiers in every case, and that no deduction should be made from any soldiers' gratuity for any military offence committed after June 28th, 1919.