OLD AGE PENSIONS.

Gisborne Times, Volume IX, Issue 900, 26 May 1903, Page 3

OLD AGE PENSIONS.

DILL DEPORE IMPERIAL PARLIAMENT. Dy Telegraph—Press Association— Copyright. LONDON, .May 23. Tiie Old Age Pensions Dill, proposing an age limit of sixty-live years, with a pension of five sinlliiigs per week, provided partly from rales and partly from the Treasury, at an estimated cost of six and a half millions, was read a second time. Mr Chamberlain, referring to Hid history of the movement, agreed ui (lie possibility of doing something to stimulate thrift and help making a provision for old ;ge. Ihe quest ion was complicated and the obstacles were great, hut not insuperable. It was not impossible to hud funds lor that. No doubt there would have to be that review oi the fiscal system which he had indicated as necessary, anu desirable at an early date. (Cheers.) Mr Long admitted that the Rill was an improvement on previous ones, lull more precise information was required. Commenting on Mr ,j. P. Remnant’s Dili, Mr Long, recalling Die demand for the remission of taxation, doubted whether a proposal necessitating a large expenditure Would he acceptable to the nat mu. The only way to raise money would he to proceed with the revision of the. liseal system. The Dill was referred to a Select Committee. Mr Chamberlain's remarks created a sensation at Westminster. It is interpreted that lie intends to push Die fiscal revision, believing the workers will support duties on foreign products if the money, is devoted to old age pensions. Mr Long urged .that the real difheully was not the principle of pensions, hut the financial foundation without which Die pensions proposals were impracticable.