§ 69. Major Beamishasked the Secretary of State for War whether he will now review the question of the non-payment of local overseas allowances to British troops in Korea; and what account has been taken of the location of wives and children of British troops in Korea in deciding that they are not eligible for local overseas allowance.
§ Mr. HeadAs regards the first part of the Question, I would refer my hon. and gallant Friend to the reply I gave to a similar Question by the hon. Member for Birmingham. Aston (Mr. Wyatt) on 4th December, 1951. As to the second part of the Question, where a family has been united with the husband at a station where local overseas allowance is issued and is allowed to remain there on the husband's posting to Korea, the married element of local overseas allowance continues to be paid. If the husband is unlikely to rejoin the family in that station the local overseas allowance is paid until the family is given a passage home.
§ 70. Major Beamishasked the Secretary of State for War whether a British soldier serving in Singapore, whose wife is living in Hong Kong, is entitled under his regulations to local overseas allowance at the new rate; and whether the same man would be so entitled is he were posted to a unit in the front line in Korea while 182W his wife and children remained in Hong Kong.
§ Mr. HeadIn the first case a soldier would draw the married unaccompanied rate appropriate to Singapore. In the second case he would not draw an allowance. In both cases the families would receive the married element of local overseas allowance so long as they are permitted to remain in the station.