THE ARMED SERVICES AND AUXILIARY SERVICES
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is a government servant, is responsible for maintaining these plans under the general direction of the Defence Secretary.
The Auxiliary Medical Service is organized to provide first aid, reinforce government and private medical establishments, and provide an augmented ambulance service in any emergency. It is built around the Medical and Health Department, the St John Ambulance Brigade and other members of the medical and nursing professions, but many people with no previous training in nursing and first aid have also been enrolled and trained to act as auxiliary nurses in hospitals or as first aid workers in the field. The service has over 5,000 members. During the year, members were present to render assistance at a considerable number of local fires and accidents.
The Civil Aid Services are responsible for all civil defence func- tions not covered by other specialist emergency services. They have an active strength of 5,000 volunteers recruited from all walks of life and trained to be of the most practical use during conditions of emergency, the most frequent of which are typhoons, floods and house collapses. The service includes units trained in fire prevention and fire-fighting, civil defence, first aid, rescue and communications, and has its own despatch rider service. A training school is maintained at which full-time courses for officers, super- visors and specialists are conducted. All members train part-time, normally in the evening. Regular exercises are staged realistically in heavily populated areas and concentrate on dealing with the problems and hazards which dense population and a wide variety of building structures create. A number of volunteer members have recently been trained at the Civil Defence Staff College and Civil Defence schools in Britain, where they attained a high standard.
The professional element of the Fire Service is supported by an Auxiliary Fire Service of some 800 volunteers who attend fire stations several times each week for training sessions, and who are called upon as reinforcements during major fires or widespread emergencies.
Apart from training to meet emergencies and assisting at major disasters, there are many instances every year of members of all the auxiliary services giving help and first aid, in an individual capacity, at all kinds of accidents and incidents.