OLD AGE PENSIONERS

Hokitika Guardian, 28 March 1924, Page 3

OLD AGE PENSIONERS

WANT 25s PER WEEK. WELLINGTON, March 26. The dissatisfaction which has prevailed for some time amongst old-age pensioners at the inadequacy of the pension to meet the present cost of living crystallised yesterday in the form of a largely attended meeting in the Trades Hall at which proposals were formulated for granting some measure of relief. Mr I’. Fraser ALE’., presided and apologised for the absence of Messrs A. L. Mouteith and R. McKeen, M.P.s. The general feeling, said Mr Fraser was that it was quite impossible for people to live on 15s a week, the present pension. The object of the 1 elision was that people .should live on it, and he, and those associated with him, felt that it should he increased so as to bring it up to a reasonable amount. Under the circumstances it was thought that a deputation might he formed to wait upon the Minister for Pensions and urge the necessity of an increase. Another thing which had to l>e considered was the advisability of raising the limit which a person might earn without having his or her pension affected. The present system operated in the direction of sending people into old neople’s homes, but the old-age pension was first of all intended to enable people to live in their own homes as Ring SH tl}«Y UP!? phpunliY re!!; TiK)

old' ago pension was not, and was never intended, -to be, a matter of charity, but was really a contribution from the State which pensioners received as oi right in recognition of a lifetime’s labour in the interests of the community.

It was decided that a depuattion should wait upon the Minister to ask that the pension be raised to 25s per week; that the amount to he earned by pensioners be increased, and the amount of property which could be held be increased from £390, so as to include the average in which they lived and used for their own purposes.