§ 25. Lieut.-Colonel Sir J. NORTON GRIFFITHSasked the Secretary of State for War whether a considerable number of public school boys, who voluntarily joined the Artists Rifles (Officers' Training Corps) in 1918 with a view to obtaining commissions, were compulsorily and permanently transferred, when their course of training was almost completed to the 5th Battalion King's Royal Rifle Corps as riflemen instead of passing into an Officers' Cadet Battalion; whether Colonial members of the same Officers' Training Corps were sent to No. 11 Officers' Cadet Battalion, Pirbright, given commissions, and then demobilised; and whether some compensation will be made to these public school boys for the inequality of treatment and the disadvantages they have suffered?
Captain GUEST (Joint Parliamentary Secretary to the Treasury)I would refer my hon. and gallant Friend to the reply given yesterday to similar questions asked by my hon. and gallant Friends the Members for Epping and Finchley. In this reply it was explained that members of the Inns of Court Officers' Training Corps were ordinary enlisted soldiers and as such were liable for service in the Army unless they could be demobilised under the Regulations in force. The Colonial members were under an agreement as to repatriation under a scheme made with the various Governments. It was for this reason and 1574 for the better organisation of repatriation that these members were collected and placed at the Officers' Cadet Battalion mentioned.