asked the Parliamentary Secretary to the Admiralty why it was considered necessary to recruit 22,609 men to the R.N. and 2,037 men to the R.M. on emergency engagements in the first 11 months of 1946, in view of the fact that the release programme of the R.N. is 14 groups ahead of that of the Army and that of the R.M. is 20 groups ahead.

Mr. Dugdale:

Under the policy already announced, the last of the age and service groups, i.e. the men called up before 1st January, 1947, will be released en or before 31st December, 1948. As that date approaches, the three Services will draw into line as regards the groups released. Thus, the rate of release of groups in the Army and Royal Air Force will necessarily accelerate in relation to that of the Navy. The intake into the Navy in 1946 had this in mind, and was also designed to keep the various branches of the Navy reasonably in line as regards release.

Is my hon. Friend aware that the release rate in the three Services is to come more into line in the future, and must, indeed, come more into line, and will he not explain to the men in the Army why a man in the Navy gets out in half the time that they do, when the Navy is still calling up civilians for the Navy who might go to swell the ranks of the Army and the Air Force, and thus allow men in those two Services to get out earlier?

Mr. Dugdale:

I cannot explain these matters to men in the Army; that is not a matter for me.