WAR PENSIONS.

Taranaki Daily News, 9 December 1915, Page 6

WAR PENSIONS.

MYSTERIOUS MR. MASSEY. THE POLICY OF WAIT-AND-SEE, (From Our Own Correspondent.) Wellington, Dec. 6 The Prime Minister did not make an effective or-satisfying reply to the deputation which waited upon him to-day to urge tha't the War Pensions Act should be amended in the direction of giving security to the dependents of men who have died at the front, and of removing admitted anomalies. Mr. Massey said, in effect, that the New Zealand pensions system was the best in the world and that it should be given a fair trial before it was amended. When he was told that the present uncertainty was damaging recruiting he said that the agitation against the Act was doing the harm. The suggestion that a special session of Parliament should be called to deal with the matter he countered with an assertion that it would cost £IO,OOO to assemble the members of Parliament for a fortnight. He spoke, rather irrelevantly, about the cost of running Bellamy's and the travelling expenses of the numerous officers of the House and the Council, But he made no definite promise of reform in any important respect, so that the work the War League has set out to accomplish is still to do. Undoubtedly this pensions controversy is damaging recruiting. The sooner the Government recognises that fact and faces the situation in some effective way the better for everybody concerned. The whole argument can be boiled down into one concrete case—that of the married man who is .deciding whether or not it is his duty to go to the front. The man can ascertain what he will receive and what allocation he will be able to make in favour of his wife and children. He can ascertain what allowance will be made to him and to the members of his family if he comes back disabled, because in that case a pension will be his by right. But he cannot get any definite assxirance regarding the payment of a pension to his wife and children if he is killed, since the decision oh that point will be made by the Pensions Board after his death is reported. If he leaves his wife a little insurance money or a small nest-egg in the bank the Board may reduce the amount of the pension payable to her. It is no reply to tell him that the Board is not doing that sort of thing. The point is that the Board has the power and the man will not take the risk. The Board may refuse the widow any pension at all if it thinks her means are already sufficient for her support. Let the Government say that widow and children shall have a pension by right, and half this trouble would be avoided.

Naturally there is a good deal of speculation as to the meaning to be attached to some words used by the Prime Minister to-day. "Don't imagine that wc are not doing anything in regard to recruiting because we are not making a noise," said Mr. Massey. "Wc are doing a lot, and when the time comes, as it will come within the next week oV two, to tell you what we are doing I think the county will be surprised." Seen later in the day by your correspondent, Mr. Massey said, with a smile, that he had nothing to add to his rather mysterious words. One gathers that the National Register wil be completed by the end of this week or the beginning of next week, and Mr. Massey has said already that when the figures are complete, and Cabinet has laarned just what the resources of the Dominion are in able-bodied men of military age, lie wjll have a statement to make, regarding the whole question of recruiting. Presumably the surprise that he referred to today will have something to do with that promised statement. Speculation on the point does not seem particularly profitable. New Zealand will have to wait and see.