Untitled

New Zealand Illustrated Sporting & Dramatic Review, Issue 1469, 20 June 1918, Page 3

“Although,” said Captain Carmichael, M.C., the popular Australian officer who recently returned from the front and raised a battalion known as “Carmichael’s Thousand,” in addressing a meeting in Sydney the other day, “we always recognised in our pre-war days the value of comradeship, few of us realised, as many of us do now, the full significance of the word. Those of us who have been to the front know and appreciate the binding and lasting influence for good it has on a man’s life. War has its beautiful side. Its grim realities bring out in bold relief all those fine qualities in man which, for the want of contrast, are, in times of peace, to some extent lost sight of. War creates for him new ideals to live up to; new aspirations that give him a fresh interest in life. After he has experienced the thrills and the fascinating grandeur of battle a man sees himself in a different and better light. The spirit of comradeship which has been prompting Australians to go in spasmodic numbers to the aid of their mates in France is but a shadow of what they will find within them when they hear the thundering noise of the guns and stand side by side in a clash of arms. The feeling of comradeship is then something worth living for. It becomes a very potent and elevating joy in one’s existence. When our warriors now in various parts of the war zone return to Australia there will be a bond of brotherhood among them that death only will destroy. It has already been prospectively spoken of as “One Big Union.”

Mr. Lindley Jones, who has undertaken the saving of waste paper all over the United Kingdom for the Paper Commission, has set up agents all over the country. The roughest kind of waste paper, rescued from dust bins, fetches ss. per cwt., and good clean newspapers and books £24 a ton. In the city of London alone £BOO was made in January from waste paper, and the estimates are £7OOO to £BOOO for 1918. Plans are on foot at the present time to establish two ironworks in the South of Sweden —one in Landskrona, the other in Gothenburg, according to present design. A number of the persons interested in the Landskrona works are closely connected with the Oresund Shipyard; and the intention is that the works should specialise in ships’ plates on a large scale. At the Gothenburg works there is expected to be ah output of not less than 200,000 tons' per annum. It was recently announced through Commonwealth Military Orders issued that returned soldiers who have been re-enlisted or appointed to a military unit in Australia, or who return to duty with the unit with which they originally served, will continue to wear on both sleeves of their jacket and greatcoat the shoulder patches of the Australian Imperial Force Unit in which they last served. This- order means that the rising sun on the left shoulder is abolished'. An order

issued provides that members of the A.I.F. may obtain articles on paymen to supplement the free issue of the authorised kit, provided ample stocks exist, and provided the articles are for the personal use of the soldiers concerned. Payment will be recovered by deductions from pay.

A good deal of dissatisfaction has been caused among railway workers in Australia by the Commissioners’ efforts to institute a medical examination system, not only for new men but also for old employees, in order to endeavour to lessen the Department’s risks under the new Accident Compensation Act. The men on several railway works have refused to undergo the examination. Dr. Arthur, M.L.A., has taken the matter up, and is urging that the examination should be dropped. He considers that the Department is setting outside employers a very bad example. If the result of the Act were to be that only perfectly fit men were to be employed as labourers a great number would be thrown out of employment. In Dr. Arthur’s opinion, men who were employed before the Act came into force should certainly not be discharged because of defects that might be the cause of claims under the Act. All the Department should require was that they should be able to do the work. The Department’s total risk was only slightly affected by the inclusion of men not of a perfect standard of fitness.