DOMESTIC SERVICE SIR, —Mary Upton accuses me of suggesting that after
the war " forced labour " (to use her expression) should be pressed into domestic service. This is an occupation to which, if she will re-read my article, she will see that I never referred. What I did say was that " more domestic help must be organised." A very different proposal and a more com- prehensive one.
Some of this help, it is true, may be in the form of domestic service
in the generally accepted use of those words. If so, it will only be attracted if more adequate conditions, training and status are made universal. What, however, I had chiefly in mind was an extension of the home help system which many local authorities have already in operation, but on too limited a scale. This could be both voluntary and, as Mary Upton suggests, by means of a " conscripted National Service Army " in which every girl would be expected to take part.—Yours, &c.,
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