NATIONAL SERVICE BILL. (Hansard, 15 December 1942)

§ LORD SNELL

My Lords, I beg to move that this Bill be now read a second time. The main purpose of the Bill is to enable the calling-up age for men to be reduced from 18½ to 18 years, and to enable the preliminary stages of registration and medical examination to take place before that age, so that those who are to be called up can be called up immediately on reaching the age of 18. It is not the intention of the Government to lower the age of liability to serve, which, under the National Service Acts, has always been 18; but this Bill will enable men to be called up at that age instead of having first to go through certain preliminary stages. The present position is that men cannot be called up for a substantial period—varying from four to six months—after they have reached the age of 18. They have to wait until certain essential preliminary stages have been completed; for example, there must be a Royal Proclamation in respect of their particular age group; then there must be the registration of that group and their qualifications must be verified, and there is also the medical examination. It is not proposed to reduce the age at which men will be liable for service overseas below 19 years, but it is considered that when men are sent overseas for service they should be fortified by a year's training, instead of being thrown, perhaps only half prepared, into the perils of battle.

There have been successive reductions in the age of calling up, and these have been rendered necessary by the requirements of the man-power situation. There was first the reduction from 20 to 19, at a time when men up to the age of 36 had been registered and then called up. The age was further reduced to 18½ after the registration and call-up of men of 40 years of age. The present need for man-power is well known, and the alternative to what is now proposed under this Bill would be in the first place a further withdrawal of young men from essential industries, or secondly, to secure a certain but insufficient number by the extension of the upper limit of call-up to the age of 46. It may be noted that doctors and dentists up to that age are being called up, and it 529 may yet be necessary to extend the upper limit to the age of 46, but that would offer no substitution for the reduction of the lower limit to 18 years. It may interest your Lordships to be reminded of what the conditions are in other countries. In Russia, I understand, the general age of call-up is 17. In Germany, the 1925 class registered last June; that is, they would be between 16½ and 17½ years old. In Italy the call-up is generally at 19. In the countries of other Allied Powers it is 18. The reduction of the age now proposed indicates that the mobilization of man-power is now reaching its final stages, and the purpose of the Bill is to enable mobilization to be completed.

I do not think it is required that I should give more than a very short description of die contents of the Bill itself. Clause 1, which is the main clause of the Bill, will enable men to be registered one. medically examined before 18, but ensures that no man shall be posted to the Forces before his 18th birthday. Some important matters are dealt with in subsections (1) and (2) of Clause 1. These deal with the power to register before the age of liability to be called up and introduce a new term into the National Service Acts—namely, "subject to registration." That is intended to cover not only those who have reached the age of 18 but also those below the age, when liable to be called up, Subsection (3) deals with provisions regarding the registration and medical examination, and applications for postponement, conscientious objection, and so on.

Clause 2 has the object of simplifying procedure foe Royal Proclamations which is at present somewhat unnecessarily complicated. It provides not only that the Proclamation covers men who have reached the age of 18 on the date of issue, but carries its operation into the future and brings into liability younger mer. as soon as they reach that age. Clause 3(1) relates to the exemption of certain British subjects belonging to the Dominions, who are not now called up unless they are ordinarily resident in Great Britain. This subsection empowers the making of Defence Regulations to enable the Government to make new arrangements in order to overcome the anomalies which the present Regulations do not meet. Clause 4 enables the Bill to be subsequently amended by Defence 530 Regulation. This provision is common form in all the National Service Acts. I think it is not necessary for me to give further details. What the Bill is asking for is judged by His Majesty's Government to be vital and necessary, and I therefore beg to move.