HC Deb 01 October 1941 vol 374 c601W
Mr. Groves

asked the Minister of Health whether it is within the province of the Central Medical War Committee to prevent the granting of commissions to medical officers employed in the Home Guard; whether there is any representative of the Home Guard on this committee; and whether there is any appeal from the decisions of central or local medical war committees in connection with the employment of medical officers in the Home Guard?

Mr. E. Brown

In order to avoid undue interference with the medical organisation of the locality, Army Council instructions provide that no medical practitioner is to be enrolled in the Home Guard unless previous permission has been given by the local medical war committee. It is open to any practitioner aggrieved by the medical war committee's decision to communicate with the Central Medical War Committee under whose general directions the local committees act in this as in other matters relating to the selection of doctors for war-time services. If he is dissatisfied with the conclusion of the central committee and wishes to make representations to me I shall of course be prepared to consider them. There is no representative of the Home Guard as such in the membership of the central committee, but an observer attends on behalf of the War Office.