15.
asked the Secretary of State for War whether he will recommend an increase in the basic pay of junior officers to compensate them for the loss of field allowance?
There has been no alteration in the conditions of entitlement to field allowance. When an officer ceases to draw field allowance on 'being provided with furnished accommodation the expenses for which the allowance is given are no longer incurred, and no question of compensation therefore arises.
Is it not a fact that many of these junior officers have looked upon field allowance as extra pay? Now that these officers have been given a coal bucket and coal scuttle it hardly compensates for the loss of their pay.
I do not accept my hon. and gallant Friend's description of the new procedure as an accurate one, and in any case, although officers may have come to regard field allowance as part of their emoluments, it was always a conditional allowance, and there was no warrant for their so regarding it.