LETTERS TO THE EDITOR.
THE GOVERNMENT SEPARATION ALLOWANCE.
[To TIM EDTTOE Or TEl " SmTATM"" Sin,—As one who has been working for the last two months among the soldiers' wives in a very poor district of London, may I suggest that the present controversy as to whether the Government separation allowance is adequate is quite missing the point ? My conviction is that the women cannot manage on the separation allowance without the addition of the man'. allotment, and equally that the man cannot afford to spare that allotment out of his pay. The present scale, which can be seen in any post office, states that a wife alone gets 12s. 6d. weekly; a wife with one child 15s., with two children 17s. 6d., with three children 20s., 4kc. (These sums are exclusive of an extra 3s. 6c1. weekly for London area.) This scale makes life just possible in most cases, but 12s. 6d. weekly for woman alone, whose husband was probably earning double that amount, is a great come-down.
Still, putting that aside, does the public, who after all pays the bill, realize that of that 12s. 6d. the soldier himself, from his pay of 7s. a week, has to contribute 3s. 6d. ? And further, that in the case of a man with three children, out of the weekly 20s. the soldier is contributing 5s. 3d., leaving him with the magnificent sum of ls. 9d. a week, out of which he has to pay for his suppers, his washing, his cleaning materials, his hair-cutting, repairs to boots, smokes, drinks, stamps, &c., and his insurance of lid.? Under the latest War Office regulations, if the man feels he cannot afford the allotment he may decline to pay it. At the same time, if the wife says she cannot manage without it she may appeal, and then the man will be compelled to pay it. What is happening now in
many cases is that the man is making the full allotment, leaving himself practically penniless, and the wife is struggling to save a few shillings every week to send back to her husband to enable him to buy a supper, a cake of soap, or some such luxury. Is this right ? There are, of course, cases where, owing to the generosity of the man's former employer, the woman can manage without the husband's allotment, but in thousands of cases the separation allowance is the woman's only source of income, and in these cases she cannot manage without the allotment, which I maintain the man cannot afford to spare.
Can any of your influential readers bring pressure to bear on the Government to introduce a scheme by which, in those cases where the woman has nothing but the separation allow- ance, this may be supplemented, not by charity, nor by depriving the man of practically all his pay, but by some Government grant ; or better still, provide the man with all necessaries, an evening meal, washing, insurance, cleaning materials, lec., leaving him with a clear 7s. a week, out of which he could then afford to send 5s. a week to his wife or
other dependant F—I am, Sir, &c., A SOLDIER'S WIFE.
[The proper solution, in our opinion, is that the soldier should be " all found and well found," and that the miserable little deductions for necessaries should cease altogether, leaving him with his clear shilling a day. The ideal is that a man should be able to exist in the Army without spending a single penny of his pay on himself.—ED. Spectator.]
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