EXEMPTION WANTED

Wairarapa Times-Age, 2 May 1938, Page 8

EXEMPTION WANTED

FROM SUPERANNUATION PAYMENTS UNDER THE PROPOSED STATE SCHEME. POSITION OF PUBLIC SERVANTS. (By Telegraph —Press Association.) WELLINGTON, This Day. The full preservation of existing Public Service superannuation funds, including a continuance of compulsory contributions for present employees and future entrants to the Public Service and secondly, provision for contributors to existing superannuation funds to be exempt from that portion of the proposed special tax of one shilling in the pound which is actuarilly assessed as required to provide the proposed additional pensions, were proposals put before the Parliamentary Committee on Superannuation and National Health in a statement presented by Mr F. W. Millar, honorary secretary of the Central Committee of the combined Public Service organisations. Mr Millar said his organisation represented eleven Public Service associations, with a total membership of 51,560. “Statements already made by individual members of the Government have been to the effect that existing Public Service schemes will be safeguarded,” Mi’ Millar’s statement says, “but in the absence of any specific provisions it is incumbent upon the Public Service organisations formally to express their unanimous desire for preservation of their superannuation funds.”

The statement detailed the financial position of the funds and the history of their growth and concluded: “Public servants yield the forefront to no section of the community in their public spirit and willingness to shoulder their fair share of direct and indirect taxation. When, however, there is proposed a special tax for increased pensions in which, except in extraordinary circumstances, the very compulsory nature of their inclusion in the State superannuation funds would debar them from participation, they consider that the committee cannot but agree that our claims for partial exemption from the proposed special tax are reasonable.”

The Minister of Finance (the Hon W. Nash) asked if public servants would have objected to an increase in old age pensions made from the Consolidated Fund. Mr Millar: “That all depends. We have had to deal with the scheme as outlined. That question raises another aspect.”

Mr Nash. “You, as a service, would not object to the Government providing for people in the community who cannot provide for themselves and never will be able to?” Mr Millar: “No.” Mr Nash: "If the contribution made for the payment of pensions to everybody does not proportionately exceed the sum that is paid by the State to public servants, would public servants object-” Mr Millar: “I don’t know whether they would object. Public servants were given an inducement to join up and to stick to their jobs in order to get superannuation benefits.” Mr Nash: “I don’t say that public servants have had a fair deal. I don t think the superannuation scheme has been properly managed.” Mr Millar, replying to other questions, said he did not think public servants would object from the social point of view to assistance being given xo those who were not able to care for themselves. FORMER PUBLIC SERVANTS PROPOSALS SUBMITTED TO COMMITTEE. (By Telegraph—Press Association). WELLINGTON, This Day. A statement was presented to the committee by the Superannuated Public Servants’ Association, which asked leave to present evidence in support and explanation of its proposals. It proposed that every married superannuitant whose present allowance was £3 a week oi’ less, and every unmarried superannuitant whose allowance was thirty shilling a week or less, should be given the option of transferring to the new national scheme without any transfer from the present to the new fund of any contributions to the former. It also suggested that any superannuitant who made the transfer should be deemed to have £1 a week of income “from other sources,” and that if his present allowance is £1 a week or less (or 30s or less), he should, on his transfer to the new scheme, still receive £1 a week from the present superannuation fund as “income from other sources.” The statement contends that the adoption of these proposals would cover quite a large proportion of the hardships borne by men who, under the Finance Act, 1931, were compulsorily retired. It also suggests that widows of former superannuitants should come under the same benefits as those which would be approved under the above proposals. The final suggestion is that taxpayers over the age of sixty, and superannuitants irrespective of age, should under the new scheme be required to pay out of their “personal income” only, such portion, if any, of the new tax of a shilling in the pound as the State deemed to be allocated to the needs of the health insurance scheme, as apart from the national superannuation scheme.