This is an entry in a year-long project to post-blog the demobilisation experience for British servicemen at the end of the Second World War. See here for an introduction to the project and here for a brief overview of the demobilisation process.
In the Daily Mail, Garry Allighan laments the "rich crop of frustration" caused by the holdups in Class B early demobilisation for 'key men' needed for industrial reconstruction. "Both the men in the Forces and employers are dazed with bewilderment ...
One fact is certain: either Class B has to be rapidly extended to cover many thousands of men it now excludes or it may as well be abolished. Perhaps the latter is the best course, because the existence of Class B defeats and denies the basic principle of the Release Scheme. It is the negation of the age and service qualification. As it now stands it is a failure because it has not achieved its minimum objective: Class B releases equal to one-tenth of those under Class A ... that is not enough. The building trade is hamstrung for want of a million workers who are now in the Services doing senseless fatigues instead of building houses ...
Meanwhile, in the Daily Herald, Captain Raymond Blackburn raises an issue which "may not seem very important, but arouses very keen interest" amongst the demobilised: the award of medals and medal ribbons. Regular soldiers from the ranks who were commissioned shortly before they had completed the 18 years of unblemished service required to receive the Long Service and Good Conduct Medal are annoyed that they are no longer eligible for the coveted award. And men of the Territorial Army are anxious that they should receive the traditional honorific 'T' on their medal ribbons: "They should have some outward mark of their readiness to take the most active part in the war at the earliest moment."
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