FRIENDLY SOCIETIES' BENEFITS

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LIII, Issue 81, 14 July 1910, Page 5

FRIENDLY SOCIETIES' BENEFITS

HAPHAZARD AND UNSOUND FINANCE. (From Our Parliamentary Reporter.) Wellington, Last Night. The Registrar of Friendly Societies, in his annual report, says that thirty-two new branches were registered during the year. Under the heading, "Unsound Finance," the Registrar says: "In my 1908 report I referred to the adoption in New Zealand by certain friendly societies of the special levy or assessment system of providing for death benefits. The Parliamentary Committee that investigated the proposed legislation of that year adduced much valuable information on this subject, and the evidence of the actuary of the Department made it abundantly clear that no such haphazard method of providing for life assurance or death benefits can guarantee any security, and that a scale of contributions, graduated according to age on the lines adopted bv all New Zealand friendly societies for insuring their usual benefits, affords the only satisfactory means of meeting their liabilities. The introduction of this pernicious scheme fnr offering large d°ath benefits, without ndennate provision, is probably the most dangerous attack vet made on the stnb'litv s>nd <roo'l standing of our sorVties. and «honld it spread *hrnughe"t these valuable organisations the friendlv society movement in this country will most certainly receive a serious setback, and bring nothing lwt disappointment to numbers of persoi s who have been induced to ioin the scheme. WhHevev mav lip. snid to the contrary, the ov=+pms that have been adopted in N»w Zealand are on the pome fallnomiis hasta «« similar schemes that have bppn and are now working such havoc among fm.i temal societies in America, and anv dif-l ference in detail that mav exist i« to the disadvantage of the New Zealand I svetem.