National Service Act 1964

National Service Act 1964
National Service Act 1964
Parliament of Australia
	Long title An Act to Amend the National Service Act 1951-1957 ;
Citation	No. 126 of 1964
Territorial extent	States and territories of Australia
Royal assent	24 November 1964
Repealed	30 June 1992
Amends
	National Service Act 1951
Repealed by
	Defence Legislation Amendment Act 1992
	Status: Repealed

The National Service Act 1964 (Cth) is a repealed amendment of the Parliament of the Commonwealth of Australia, passed on 24 November 1964. It amended the National Service Act 1951 to require 20-year-old males to serve in the Army for a period of twenty-four months of continuous service (reduced to eighteen months in 1971) followed by three years in the Reserve.

The Defence Act 1965 amended the Defence Act 1903 in May 1965 to provide that conscripts could be obliged to serve overseas, and in March 1966 Prime Minister Harold Holt announced that National Servicemen would be sent to Vietnam to fight in units of the Australian Regular Army.

Background

On 5 November 1964, Cabinet decided to introduce a compulsory selective National Service scheme. In announcing this decision to Parliament, Prime Minister Robert Menzies referred to 'aggressive Communism', developments in Asia such as 'recent Indonesian policies and actions' and a 'deterioration in our strategic position' as being influential in the decision being reached. The Government had concluded that Australia had inadequate defence manpower and aimed to increase the strength of the Army to 33,000 by the end of 1966 by introducing national service.^[1]^[2]

Provisions

Sections 5–9 deal with the amendments to registration. Sections 10–14 and 16 deal with the liability to serve, with sections 15, 17 and 18 accommodating the conscript's civilian employment.^[3]

Reaction

Then Leader of the Opposition and Leader of the Australian Labor Party, Arthur Calwell, called the scheme the 'lottery of death'.^[4]

Legacy

Between 1965 and December 1972, over 800,000 men registered for National Service, with some 63,000 conscripted and over 19,000 serving in Vietnam. Although registration was compulsory, a biannual process of selection by ballot determined who would be called up. The ballots selected several dates in the selected period and all males with corresponding birthdays were called up for national service. The ballot was conducted using a lottery barrel and marbles representing birthdays.

Conscription ended as one of the first acts of the newly elected Labor Whitlam government in December 1972.

References

Citations

^ Robert Menzies, Prime Minister (10 November 1964). "House of Representatives 10 November 1964 25th Parliament 1st Session". Parliamentary Debates (Hansard). Commonwealth of Australia: House of Representatives. Defence Review Ministerial Statement. Archived from the original on 27 May 2024. Retrieved 27 May 2024 – via historichansard.net.
^ "National service, 1965–72". National Archives of Australia. Archived from the original on 26 May 2024. Retrieved 17 August 2021. This article incorporates text from this source, which is by © Commonwealth of Australia (National Archives of Australia) 2023. available under the CC BY 4.0 license.
^ National Service Act 1964 (Cth)
^ "Decisions". Museum of Australian Democracy. The National Service Act 1964. Archived from the original on 29 April 2023. Retrieved 2 September 2021. Under the National Service Scheme, all 20 year-old males were required to register for national service. Their names were selected by the 'birthday ballot', in which men were randomly selected for national service by their date of birth. Marbles marked with a date were drawn out of a Tattersall's lottery barrel. Such a draw occurred every six months and on average, an Australian male stood a one in 10 or one in 12 chance of being selected. The Leader of the Opposition, Arthur Calwell, described this system as a 'lottery of death'. Those who were selected for national service were required to serve for two years full-time in the regular army, and three years part-time in the reserves.

Notes

[1] Robert Menzies, Prime Minister (10 November 1964). "House of Representatives 10 November 1964 25th Parliament 1st Session". Parliamentary Debates (Hansard). Commonwealth of Australia: House of Representatives. Defence Review Ministerial Statement. Archived from the original on 27 May 2024. Retrieved 27 May 2024 – via historichansard.net.

[2] "National service, 1965–72". National Archives of Australia. Archived from the original on 26 May 2024. Retrieved 17 August 2021. This article incorporates text from this source, which is by © Commonwealth of Australia (National Archives of Australia) 2023. available under the CC BY 4.0 license.

[3] National Service Act 1964 (Cth)

[4] "Decisions". Museum of Australian Democracy. The National Service Act 1964. Archived from the original on 29 April 2023. Retrieved 2 September 2021. Under the National Service Scheme, all 20 year-old males were required to register for national service. Their names were selected by the 'birthday ballot', in which men were randomly selected for national service by their date of birth. Marbles marked with a date were drawn out of a Tattersall's lottery barrel. Such a draw occurred every six months and on average, an Australian male stood a one in 10 or one in 12 chance of being selected. The Leader of the Opposition, Arthur Calwell, described this system as a 'lottery of death'. Those who were selected for national service were required to serve for two years full-time in the regular army, and three years part-time in the reserves.

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