Cost of Pensions

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 717, 17 July 1929, Page 8

Cost of Pensions

Overhaul of System Needed

(TUB SUN'S Parliamentary Reporter) PARLIAMENT BLDGS., Today. PENSIONS payments last year cost the country £108,053 more than during the previous 12 months, mainly because there were 2,341 more people collecting from the State through these channels. With the object of clearing up anomalies, the Government promised in Parliament yesterday that a complete overhaul of the pensions system would soon be undertaken.

In the Pensions Department report, which was discussed in the House of Representatives yesterday, it was shown that last year £2,613,770 was paid out, as against £2,721,823 this year. There is also a rise in the number of pensioners, there being 56,590 this year and 54,249 last. These are divided into the classes, war, old-age, widows, Maori war, miners, epidemic, blind, Boer war, sundry pensions and annuities, Cevil Service Act, 1908, and family allowances. This year there were 20,686 war pensioners and 26,110 old-age pensioners, costing respectively £1,184,003 and £1,060,760. ADJUSTMENT NEEDED The cost a head of European population for 1928-29 was £1 18s 9d, as against £1 17s 8d in 1927-28. On behalf of other Governments New Zealand paid out £214,763 to 3,187 pensioners. After a considerable amount of discussion in the House, the Hon. T. M. Wilford, speaking as Minister in Charge of the War Pensions Department, said that the time had come in New Zealand for a review of the whole pensions system. Since coming into office and taking charge of the department, which included 10,000 permanently disabled soldier pensioners, and 2,000 temporarily disabled men, he had come across several anomalies in the pensions legislation. For example, a blind soldier in receipt of a small income was deprived of the right to a pension allowance for children. That should be adjusted. This should be done in one big Bill. Reciprocity of pensions with the Old Country also must be arrived at in the near future. The whole review would need careful investigation and the cost would have to be considered. In regard to proof of a disability being attributable to the war, Mr. Wilford said that he had instructed

his department that family doctors should he called in to prove war as a cause of a disability. In his reply to the debate, Mr. W. A. Veitch, Minister of Pensions, gave Parliament credit for removing anomalies from time to time, and said the question of reciprocity had been raised since he had been in office. The financial position of the country had to be considered before coming to a final decision. The ideal, of course, would be reciprocity between all parts of the Empire, but that was not a practical proposition. At the moment it was not yet known what attitude the new Government at Home intended taking up on the question. STAGGERED AT COST Touching upon the question of in creases in pensions, the Minister said that he felt sure that people would be staggered at the aggregate cost involved. He was not going to be so unwise, or so insincere, as to suggest that there was any possibility of an increase being made in the near future. Of all improvements necessary in pensions he sincerely believed tbat a pension for invalid husbands was most desirable. It was not the policy of the Government to economise at the expense of the pensioners. The question of attributability was of very great importance and undoubtedly was the most difficult problem connected with pensions legislation. The Minister concluded by stating that the points raised by the various speakers would be gone into, including the question of arranging, if possible, that the police should carry out their inquiries relative to pensions in mufti. He would confer with the Minister of Justice on that point, and no doubt a satisfactory solution would be found.