What was claimed
Every 14-year-old boy in Australia was issued a rifle in 1958 as part of school cadet programs.
Our verdict
False. School cadet programs were not universal or compulsory in the late 1950s and only a small minority of eligible boys participated.
AAP FACTCHECK - Bob Katter is falsely claiming that all Australian boys were handed rifles under school cadet programs when he was a teenager in the late 1950s.
But school cadet programs were not universal or compulsory in the late 1950s, and only a minority of eligible boys participated, according to historical sources.
A leading historian told AAP FactCheck the veteran Queensland MP's claim was "completely wrong".
Mr Katter made the false claim in a widely shared Facebook video in late July, saying he was handed a rifle when he was aged 13, which would have been in either 1958 or 1959.
"Every single boy in Australia at 14, you know I was a bit ahead of myself, was handed a rifle," Mr Katter said in the video (timestamp 20 seconds).
When asked for evidence for the claim, Mr Katter's office referenced universal cadet training, which was undertaken at many Australian schools during the 20th century.
His office said that while universal cadet training ceased in the late 1920s, many schools still required all male students to participate into the 1950s and 1960s.
Mr Katter's claims are false. While school cadet training did exist in the late 1950s when Mr Katter was 13, it was not compulsory across Australia, and only a minority of students were enrolled.
There is no evidence to support his claim that all 14-year-olds in Australia were given rifles in 1958 or 1959.
According to the Oxford Companion to Australian Military History, the first school-based cadet unit was established at St Mark's Collegiate School (later The King's School) in Sydney in 1866.
Cadet training was made compulsory in 1911, and boys aged 12 to 14 were enrolled in non-uniformed, classroom-based training, though by 1922 mandatory participation was only for 17- to 18-year-olds, the Oxford Companion says.
Compulsory cadet training ended in 1929 with the abolition of universal military training, according to UNSW historian Professor Craig Stockings (page 13).
School cadet programs continued on a voluntary basis after 1929 in a variety of forms, according to the Oxford Companion.
More than 31,000 people were enrolled in school-based cadet programs in 1958, rising to more than 42,000 by 1966, which was 13 per cent of all eligible males at the time, the Oxford Companion says.
Peter Dennis, a historian at the University of New South Wales and lead author of the Oxford Companion, said school cadets weren't compulsory in the 1950s.
"Mr Katter's claim is completely wrong," Professor Dennis told AAP FactCheck.
Not all schools had a cadet unit in the 1950s, and while some cadet units were allowed to take rifles home, this wasn't a universal practice, Prof Dennis said.
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