The medical side of re-settlement was at the outset the most difficult. Accommodation for hospital treatment was scarce be cause the civil as well as the military hospitals were already being largely utilized by the army. In addition, the war was throwing up in large numbers cases for which but little or no provision had been made in peace times by voluntary effort. The Red Cross Society, which had already provided so amply for the needs of the serving soldier, readily responded to the minister's invitation to assist in the work of treating the discharged man and, with their help, additional accommodation was provided for cases of paralysis, epilepsy, neurasthenia and tuberculosis, and for the new orthopaedic treatment directed to the restoration of the function of nerve or muscle in surgical cases. Several special hospitals were also set up by other voluntary effort, and the civil hospitals agreed to take cases on terms.
The industrial re-settlement of disabled men, whose condition prevented their resuming their old occupations, was for the mo ment a simpler matter. Employment was abundant. The nucleus of an organization for the purpose was, however, created. The first condition of success was the co-operation of trades unions as well as of employers, so as to obtain union recognition for trainees in subsequent employment. For this purpose the ministry, with the help of the Ministry of Labour, formed a central com mittee (representing employers and unions) for each of the main groups of industry, and negotiated with the committee a scheme of intensive training to occupy usually not more than a year to 18 months. At the end of the course every trainee was judged by local representatives of the industry and, if he proved to have been satisfactorily trained, employment was found for him. Poly technics and technical schools and universities, along with private employers, were invited and agreed to co-operate in this scheme.
training, together with a grant of tools, if the course of train ing was satisfactorily completed. The practical working of the local arrangements for both medical treatment and training, sub ject to the regulations and general control of the ministry, was delegated to the local war pensions committees.
The efforts of the new Ministry of Pensions were successful in carrying the administration over the remainder of the war. Medical treatment, with the stimulus of the special warrant allowances, was being given by the end of the year 1918 to some 6o,000 men. Vocational training was being given to about 9,000 men. But the new organization had barely settled to its work when the Armistice was declared and demobilization began. At once a task confronted the ministry far beyond anything that its machinery was framed to deal with. Demobilization was hur ried—by March as many as 50,000 men a day were passing through the dispersal stations—and as many as four million men were discharged from the army alone during 1919. Every officer and man was required to sign a form (Z.22) in which he had an opportunity of claiming (or of disclaiming) that he was suffer ing from a disability caused by service. Those who claimed dis ability were examined at once by service medical officers, and their reports referred to the Ministry of Pensions, which made awards of pension or other grant on the basis of these reports, while the local war pension committees were empowered to deal provisionally with urgent cases. Later in the year came a fur ther volume of claims from men who had been demobilized and who found, on returning to work, that they had ailments or injuries which they claimed to be due to their service. In the course of 1919, as many as 840,000 disability claims were made, and 710,000 of them were admitted for compensation. Delay was inevitable in the settlement of this volume of cases, and the difficulties of mere machinery were complicated by other factors. The cost of living was rising to more than double (I 15% in 1919) the pre-war figure, and, although a bonus of 20% had been added to the pension rates in Nov. 1918, bringing the maximum pension for an ex-private to 33s. a week, the rates were regarded as inadequate, especially when contrasted with the high wage rates then current. The Government met the situ ation by the appointment in Jan. 1919, of a new minister of Pensions, Sir L. Worthington Evans, with a mandate to re organize the administration, and a few weeks later by setting up another select committee to review the whole scheme of pensions.