Secret Fund
When Norway was dragged into the war, Norwegian sailors had significantly higher wages than other Allied sailors. The British government feared this could have a negative influence on the other Allied sailors and pressed for wage reduction. In the summer of 1940 an agreement was signed whereby the wage difference would be placed in a special fund, to be used for the Norwegian war sailors after the war. When the war ended, the fund was some 43 million NOK.
A vocal minority with Leif Vetlesen as its spokesman argued for the money to be paid directly to the sailors and not distributed as assistance to needy seamen and seamen's widows, as the government and the seamen's organisations proposed. It became a lengthy legal process that the government won in the Norwegian supreme court in February 1954. This created much bitterness, and the issue was not permanently solved until the Norwegian Parliament in 1972 decided to pay an ex gratia sum, a total of 155 million NOK. With this all seamen or their surviving relatives received 180 NOK per month sailed. Instrumental in solving this protracted case was Rear Admiral Thore Horve, himself a veteran from the war.
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