H.—lla

on the social security forms, the coverage was deficient, and it was found to be impossible to check all the information and correct it where it was deficient. Further, a large number of married men had already joined the forces and gone overseas. A completely fresh registration was therefore decided upon, and the Proclamation authorizing the enrolment of the Second Division of the General Reserve was issued in June, 1941. Finally, naturalized British subjects were brought within the scope of the First and Second Divisions of the General Reserve, and their enrolment was directed by the issue of a Proclamation in March, 1942. It should be explained that from the basic data set out on each registration form a ballot-card was prepared, and the aggregation of all such cards formed the " ballot register " which was used directly in the selection of men for military service. It will be appreciated that the work involved in checking, indexing, and preparing ballot-cards in respect of some 400,000 registration forms and the constant attention to queries, correspondence, police investigations in cases of failure to register, notifications of changes of address, marriages, births and deaths of children, voluntary enlistment in the forces, and similar changes of circumstance, and also failures to notify changes of circumstance, together with new enrolments from youths attaining the youngest age, and from men arriving in the Dominion, and other similar matters of detail, have all combined to keep a substantial staff constantly employed in order that the register should at all times, so far as practicable, form a correct and complete record of all persons in the enrolled classes. 4. BALLOTS FOR NATIONAL SERVICE Towards the end of 1940 there was considerable pressure for speed in making men available to the Army through the new compulsory procedure, and the work of completing the ballot register covering the First Division (single men) was pressed to completion so that the first ballot could be held at the earliest possible date. This was accomplished in time for the names of the 16,000 men who had been drawn for service to be gazetted and calling-up notices delivered to the men themselves on 2nd October, 1940. This ballot, which was for Territorial service, was followed in quick succession by two further ballots. A large Territorial ballot affecting 33,717 men was gazetted on 6th November, and a smaller ballot for overseas service affecting 14,000 men was gazetted on 4th December, 1940. In the first two ballots quotas of men to be drawn were fixed in advance for each of the twelve military areas, and the selection made separately by lot from among the single men aged nineteen to forty-five resident in each of these areas. The third ballot, however, was drawn on a Dominion basis, without regard to internal subdivisions, though the pool of single men from whom the selection was made was restricted to those aged twenty-one to forty inclusive. A fourth ballot, on the same pattern as the third, but affecting 19,000 men, was gazetted on 4th March, 1941. A particular feature inherent in the method of drawing these two overseas ballots should be mentioned. Volunteers and men previously drawn for Territorial service were excluded from the pool from which Territorial ballots were drawn. They were, however, included in the pool from which subsequent overseas ballots were drawn. This resulted in the withdrawal from the Territorial Force of a large number of men for overseas service, and caused disorganization within that force. In drawing further men for Territorial service priority was therefore given to those classes who were not eligible for overseas service, and men in the nineteen-year-old and forty-one to forty-five-year-old classes were segregated and all called up for service in the fifth and sixth ballots, gazetted on 26th March and 29th April, 1941. In order to meet the steady demand for overseas reinforcements, a further 19,000 men aged twenty-one to forty were called in the seventh ballot (gazetted on 7th May), while the whole of the remaining 23,825 single men aged twenty-one to forty were called in the ninth ballot (gazetted on 6th August, 1941). In the meantime the yields from Territorial ballots had not been sufficient to meet the drain to overseas service and to build up the home defence forces to the desired extent, and consequently the eighteen-year-old class had been registered. These youths were called up in one block in the eighth ballot on 24th June, and the inflow of young men and other " seepages " into classes liable for Territorial service were thereafter called in two small ballots (the tenth and eleventh, gazetted on 19th August and Bth October, 1941, respectively). A small inflow into the overseas class, mainly comprising men who had recently attained age twenty-one, was called for overseas service in the twelfth ballot on 2nd December, 1941. December, 1941, therefore marked the end of a phase in the balloting of men for military service, independently of the other more fundamental changes in the general situation. All single men aged twenty-one to forty inclusive had been called up for overseas service, and those aged eighteen to forty-five inclusive had been called for Territorial service (a proportion of these being subsequently called for overseas service). Apart from the inflow at the youngest age, the calling of single men was now complete, and there was a period of hesitation before the calling of married men commenced. A special note should here be made regarding the continuance of volunteering for certain classes of men while balloting was actually in progress. The classes affected have been :— (i) Maoris, who have never been subjected to compulsion in the matter of military service : (ii) Air Force and Naval volunteers, who are excluded from the ballot register on being attested for service : (iii) Married men with not more than three children, who were (for a time) accepted as Territorial volunteers, while single men were being drawn for compulsory service. As regards the Air Force, every effort was made to induce men to volunteer for this service, both before and after being called by ballot. A special invitation was enclosed with the calling-up notice itself, presenting the option of joining that force.

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